Best of the Bay?

A couple of weeks ago a friend emailed to tell me that I had been nominated for SFGate's BEST OF THE BAY list, to which I replied. "Neat. What's for lunch? It's your turn to buy."

Now, it's not that I wasn't thrilled by the news, in fact, I was quite pleasantly surprised to hear that somebody noticed. (I got an email from SFGate the day before) it's just that I know how these things tend to go.

By choice, I work with only 30-35 couples per year - It's the only way I can afford to give each couple the time and attention it takes to do what I do for them. The larger operations will probably break the 1000-event mark. Knowing this, it would be foolish to entertain the idea that I'd hold my own in this arena, thus the prospect of lunch had a much more immediate appeal. Nobody really notices these things, right? I decided to ignore it.

But something interesting happened this week: I started getting dribs and drabs of email from people who DID notice, which got me to actually take a closer look this morning. I was second in the standings! (cartoon head-shaking sound) Sitting right under Fog City Entertainment, one of the better Multi-ops, in my opinion.

This got me curious, and caused me to do something I thought I'd never do: I sent out one of those pathetic "vote for me" emails. In my defense, I tried to be good about it. It was a very restrained note to a pretty limited list of people - only those who are in my new Gmail account, and only past clients and professional connections that know my work - but immediately, I felt a huge jolt of regret and fear that I had just annoyed some of of my favorite people.

I got over it though, once the congratulatory emails started to pour in. The vote tally shot up like a rocket, and I got some very kind, enthusiastic and thoughtful reviews. I am so grateful!


It's a neat feeling to have surged ahead, though I realize that this is probably a short-lived spike and others will soon mobilize their friends, clients and colleagues to vote. In any case, I have "won" with all the people that matter. Thanks again!


"You like me! You really like me!"