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When the #%*@ just won’t stick and your deadline is fast approaching, being a designer is not fun. It’s a problem every designer has faced, many times. And if you’re looking for inspiration, everyone and their uncle is ready to tell you how to find it. Even me.

But, when it comes down to it, when it’s just you and a blank, flourine-polymer, Photoshop canvas, what does any of this really mean? It’s your hump and you have to figure out how to get over it.

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My life as of late, has been nothing but work. I’ve been caught in this vicious loop that interconnects my bed, my computer and my bar tender. Seriously, I’ve been that pathetic. I’ve been so over worked that past couple weeks, that it’s all I can do to muster up enough energy to drag my sorry self to the local bar to “unwind”.

My day is like this:

• 5am Wake up to girlfriend making breakfast (we have an open loft, sound travels).
• 6am Lightly start to doze off again.
• 7am Wake up (for real)
• 7am - 7pm Check email, email clients, fix crisis, email, call project meeting, phone conference, reply to email, and maybe (if I’m lucky) design.
• 7pm - 7.5pm Stretches (while discussing with the girlfriend where to go this evening).
• 7.5pm - 8.5pm Go to Dovre for a pair of dirty martinis.

I like a good adventure, a change of pace. I just haven’t had the energy. So every night, for the last few weeks, we have ended up at the Dovre. Don’t get me wrong, I like the place. We treck all the way across the city for a decent dive bar and they don’t get much better than that.

This, lack of having anything that could even remotely resemble a life, next to a dry stick in the mud, has led to a small problem.

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I’m not one to put myself through extensive pains finding the right title for business cards. I am a designer. I design for the web. Simple enough, right? The truth, however, is that it really isn’t. It’s a curious thing when, after all this time, the title web designer isn’t specific enough. On more than a handbag full of hands, worth of occasions, have I had the following conversation:

person: So, what do you do?

me: I’m a web designer.

person: So, what do you do?

According to A List Apart’s Web Design Survey Results, only 19.9% of people surveyed in the industry identified themselves as “web designers” by title. This could of course be in part due to the fact that the others are not web designers, but rather web developers or UI designers. So where is this line drawn? I am a web designer, a developer, a programmer, a user interface specialist, an information architect etc. etc. Do we just have too many ways of identifying ourselves?

The Web Presence Therapist

At times, I think the most appropriate title for myself would be “Web Presence Therapist”, because that’s just what it feels like. Have a seat. Take a load off. Tell me all about your web based troubles. Let it all out . . . but don’t you think that has more to do with how YOU want people to experience it, as apposed to how they want to experience it?

In the end, your web person ( insert title here ) is likely performing tasks clearly outside the scope his or her title eludes to. I’m convinced that the phrase “wearing multiple hats” didn’t carry the same meaning prior to the web designer / developer. We are expected to be the one stop solution to all “your” problems. Aside from the unbalanced fact that a majority of early web designers and developers were geeks to the core, it’s no wonder early titles of the code writing guild, like “web master”, emerged in the fledgling state of this industry. It’s a ridiculous term on every level, no doubt. But somehow, in retrospect, I think it may have been the most fitting. Here’s to you, Web Masters of the world!