Four Inane Questions with freelance rockstar Julie Cortés

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Human thesaurus—and self-proclaimed freelance rockstar—Julie Cortés is one of the metro’s most prolific writers. In fact, she “lives, breathes, teaches, speaks, and coaches on all things creative self-employment,” says Cortés.

Besides running her own business for 25 years, Cortés is the founder and president of The Freelance Exchange of KC—a professional trade organization for advertising/marketing freelancers. And college students, listen up—she’s also crafted Freelancing 101, a much-needed collegiate course she teaches for the KC Art Institute. 

When she’s not busy defending the Oxford comma, Cortés is an ever-present force in the community. We may have felt slightly inferior after spying her dozens of awards for leadership and volunteerism. 

We caught up with Cortés right after she finished reading the dictionary for the seventh time to ask her our bevy of baffling questions (which, bless her heart, she proofread for us.)

The Pitch: What’s the best word in the English language that no one has ever heard of? 

Julie Cortés: Chutzpah. I love that certain Yiddish words have made it into the English language. This is one of them. It means bold, self-confident, or daring. 

I can’t say that no one has ever heard of this, though, it still trips up quite a few people. When I hear someone use this, it’s like music to my ears. They get me! My entire brand and my entire personality personifies this philosophy. I wish everyone had a lil’ chutzpah in their lives. It’d make things so much more interesting!

When was the last time you experienced buyer’s remorse?

1998—with my first marriage. [laughs] But, seriously. Take it from me, make sure you do it right the first time! I was young and not as wise as I am now. Married a man who initially checked all the boxes, especially those my parents were looking for. Two weeks before the wedding we were planning our divorce. 

It’s a long, ugly story. But I made it out alive. And, thankfully, it didn’t last all that long. Today, I refer to it as my “starter marriage.” It makes me value my current husband of 19 years even that much more. 

You can get any singer to autograph any album for you. Who is it and which album?

Sammy Hagar, without a doubt. Loved him in his Van Halen (read: Van Hagar) days. I’d probably have to go with the album 5150, Sammy’s first with the band after replacing David Lee Roth. The music is just so upbeat and inspirational, I feel like it really helped shape my teenage years. 

The song “Dreams” from that album is still one of my favorites to this day, and I still go see Sammy in concert whenever he comes here. I like DLR (Don’t @ me!), but I’m definitely Team Sammy. 

Despite being a writer, what word do you chronically misspell? 

Onery. Ack! This is embarrassing. I even had to go look it up in the dictionary just now because I still couldn’t get it right. 

This is a long-standing joke between me and my husband. When we first started dating, he used that word in an e-mail to me, and I tried to correct his spelling. It so sounds like it would be spelled similarly to “honor” to me. Despite being a writer, I’m certainly far from perfect. Thank goodness for spell check, Grammarly, and Dictionary.com!

Bonus 5th Question: You can only go on one amusement park ride the rest of your life. What you choosin’?

Oof. The older I get, the less I can go on amusement park rides. (Covers eyes and hides in corner.) I loved roller coasters back in the day—before it felt like my brain was sloshing around inside my skull, making me nauseous. 

How about the good ol’ Zambezi Zinger from Worlds of Fun? That’s making a comeback, right? And it wasn’t too horrible to begin with. A spiral track incline, a surprise tunnel, and sitting in front of one another in each car. I’ll have to try it when it opens back up.