My December to Remember 2: Day Twenty-Seven
News: JJ Watt retires from NFL.
Southwest Airlines cancels over 3K flights, says around a thousand will fly, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg nowhere to be seen.
GOP Rep-elect George Santos says he lied about resume, still intends to serve two years in Congress.
I’m tired. Ish. I feel a little burned out on writing lately. This has been quite the challenge this month, and I’m ready to take a little bit of a break. I’m also racing to the finish to get out my 50,000 words before the year is over. And of course, I save it all until the last moment. That’s kind of how I’ve always operated. I’m a professional procrastinator. And if I want to make this my lifelong career, I’ve really got to assess just how I’m doing this job.
Right now, I’ve got 42,400 words written. It’s been difficult to get over my writer’s block, but I keep reminding myself of the disappointment last month of not finishing NaNoWriMo. I got close, at least passing the halfway mark, but I just couldn’t get there. This is not entirely off-brand for me either, as I never seem to finish what I start. But I keep trying. I’ll keep starting over until I get it right, no matter how many projects I pile onto my plate.
When I get something into my head that I do want to complete, it becomes it’s own obsession for a period of time. Like these writing challenges. I know I have to write something, I know I have to get it published. I know going to sleep without doing this would result in something bad. Whatever that is, I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s what people with anxiety issues go through: the need to complete a ritual ‘or else.’ While I think in certain scenarios this could would, I wonder why it is I can’t experience consistency with my work. My real work, not my job. There will always be news, even on days it’s slow.
Last night, I told my co-worker I was going to sleep around 8:00PM. We go over the night note together each night and talk about what stories we cover the following morning. And I was actually in bed by 8:00, but didn’t fall asleep until 9:00. Something sparked in me to keep working on my story, and in about an hour I had a thousand more words written. I just couldn’t stop. I didn’t want to, even though I was increasingly tired and lying in a weird way, wrenching my body around to get both hands on the keyboard. I want this to be my focus all the time; to be able to sit with myself and tell my story. Because no one else is getting paid to pull it out of me, that’s a job for me and me alone.
I don’t know if I need to keep expecting perfection for myself on this. I’m only human after all. But I do know it does me no good to sit here with a bunch of unfinished business, letting each and every project fall by the wayside. My laziness need not win out anymore. And lucky for me, this isn’t a job I was elected to do. No one expects perfection all the time, but I don’t want to disappoint anyone either. I promise you the world, I tell you all my plans, and then we’re all just left standing there, notepads blank and no tale to tell.
So I guess I’ll keep going. We’ve gotta want at least someone to get it right around here. There’s only four more entries to occupy the space in December. It’s not a chore, it’s a choice. And one day, I’ll get to close the book on a job well done. For real this time.
