REVERB10 #2: Writing

This week I officially joined my local quilt guild. While I clearly won’t be finding a husband there, so far it seems like a riotously fun group of mostly retired women who have no compunctions about speaking their minds. It’s probably the closest thing to a crystal ball that I will ever have. However: my first order of duty is to sew friendship blocks that are Asian inspired, for someone I don’t know. I’m a little worried about this. Fortunately, I know that one of my local fabric stores carries quite a bit of Asian-inspired fabric, but I'm stumped as to what sort of pattern to use. Cross your fingers for me that delving into my stack of 10+ year old quilting magazines will unearth an idea or two!

But onward. The second Reverb10 prompt was about writing: December 2 –What do you do each day that doesn’t contribute to your writing — and can you eliminate it? (Author: Leo Babauta)

Pertaining to my own writing (as opposed to the grant writing I do at my job), I feel like I thought more about writing this year than I actually wrote. I will exceed my goal of 52 posts here on this blog (one per week), so that’s something. I did send three or four essays out, all of which were rejected. I’m actually not so fussed about those rejections, mainly because the pieces I sent out had been workshopped and I know they were well-written enough such that I am not embarrassed about them. I did, however, recently contract with a writing instructor to review one of the pieces; she gave me great feedback, and I will be reworking that over my Christmas vacation. I kept a fairly good personal journal until I changed jobs, but that kind of petered out. Last month I started using 750words, although I have rarely managed more than 3 days in a row. But it’s something. Also, I have about 70 pages of something drafted. I’m not sure what this “something” is, whether it is a collection of essays or the beginnings of a little book. I’m not sure yet what it wants to be. I suspect 2/3 of it is garbage, but there’s enough there to make me want to keep going.

There are a million things that keep me from writing as much as I want to, but the biggest problem is that there is always something else to do. Knit, sew, read, watch a movie, surf the internet, watch TV, play with the cat, call my sister, read in the bathtub, etc. For all that I do to avoid writing, one would assume I hated it. But I don’t – I actually really love it. So, then, why is it difficult to carve out time for something I love? It’s not like I have kids or a husband to take care of. (Although, conversely, this means everything gets done by me or it doesn’t get done – full time job, paying bills, oil changes, trash duty, laundry, dishes, errands, making dinner, cat wrangling, it’s ALL on me.)

Despite all this, though, I actually do a pretty good job most week days of writing something, even if it is dashing off a page or two at lunch. But I need a good chunk of uninterrupted time to really work - to revise, rewrite, mash things up, etc. And the one day of the week I have such time? Sunday. The day I always *say* I'm going to go to church/yoga class/brunch with friends but inevitably wind up sleeping until noon and spending the rest of the day in my pajamas on the couch watching chick flicks and sewing. And I really love having that one whole day with no commitments (Saturdays are guitar lessons and errands and family things. And why, yes, there IS a nagging little voice in my head that is clearing his throat, suggesting that the guitar lessons make an early exit, but I'm committed until June. And I'm determined to be a decent guitar player.) In my fantasy life I work part-time for just this reason, but right now that isn't feasible.

So I don't quite know yet how to solve this dilemma. It's a privileged dilemma, I know, but thorny nonetheless. If I could just function without sleep...

Reverb10: The Backlog

I hate it when there’s a good idea floating in the nethers of the ‘net and I find out about it too late. In this case, not TOO late, but later than I would have liked to have known about it, because now there is Catching Up to be done. And right now, “catching up” is just about the story of my life.

“It” is REVERB10, which is a series of daily prompts to encourage people to reflect on the past year and plan for the next. It's sort of ingenious, really, and complements so much of my blog reading this year, including The Happiness Project and The Art of Non-Conformity (specifically, the author's encouragement to create yearly plans). Plus, I'm a big fan of navel-gazing, particularly my own. I may not post a response to every prompt here, but rest assured I am following along. (Incidentally: one new writing tool I discovered recently is 750words, which is a place where you can write privately about things, based on the Morning Pages concept from The Artist's Way. It's free - right now, anyway- and provides a simple way of making sure I get at least some writing done every day, even if it is stream-of-conscious whining.)

But I digress! On to prompt #1: Find a word to describe 2010, and identify one for 2011.

I love this idea as I like succinct, even if the concept rarely applies to me. And I had actually been thinking about this anyway, as I wanted to spend 2011 focusing on one concept and thought that it might be helpful to find a word to sum up 2010. After much thought, I came up with the startling realization that 2010 was all about “Better”. Things got better in 2010. And, hallelujah…because for awhile there I thought I was truly doomed.

There are a host of reasons for this. 2009 was a really horrible year, for reasons I won't get into, and there really wasn't any way to go but up. My job change in August was a key factor in making 2010 "better", as was getting my cat. Having my family back from California also really helped. My guitar playing got better. My stress levels plummeted. While you wouldn’t know it to look at me, my health got better too, including my tension headaches (while they haven’t completely gone away, they became much less frequent after I changed jobs). And, save for a few icky weeks in October, I did not endure a raging case of seasonal affectedness disorder or a major depressive episode.

There are still a million things that need improvement, but for once: things got better. And there is much gratitude for that in my little heart.

As for 2011...I’m turning 40. Forty!!! My life is officially more-or-less half over, and I have so little to show for it that it is embarrassing. I’ve wasted so much TIME that I get anxious thinking about it. And a couple of recent conversations have left me rattled – one with my friend S. about the notion of ambition, and another with my guitar teacher about having a passion for something (in his case, guitar). At the moment I seem to be lacking in both the ambition and passion departments, and I’d like to end 2011 having one or both figured out. On a less ethereal plain, I need to lose weight, exercise, and start saving money like crazy so I can buy a house or a condo in the next few years so I can retire without a mortgage.

So despite the obviousness that I loathe, 2011 is the year of Forty. I don’t know exactly how this will manifest itself – lose 40 pounds, write 40 blog posts, write 40,000 words, read 40 books, sew a 40-block quilt…at the moment there seems to be enough possibilities to justify the theme. And let’s face it: it’s what I’m going to be thinking about anyway, so I may as well get something productive out of it.

Is this insomnia?

Well, so much for bedtime.

I don't know what's happened to me lately, but for the past couple of weeks I have been completely unable to sleep before 2 am. I find myself in bed watching stuff on Hulu -- like old Mary Tyler Moore episodes, and most recently this cancelled ABC Family show based on the movie "10 Things I Hate About You", which wasn't quite "My So-Called Life" but actually pretty good. I was a lot like Kat in high school...and my sister was a lot like Bianca. In some ways, it's kind of scary how close to home it can hit...for example, in one episode an elderly woman chastises Kat and tells her, "I know a lot of girls like you who wound up being old cat ladies", a fate I am beginning to wholeheartedly embrace. (Except that tonight the cat managed to drag my sort of heavy wool coat off the chair and onto her wet cat food, which she likes to cover up despite my regular reassurances that I have no interest in eating it.)

But back to the not sleeping thing. It's not stress. I'm not depressed. It might be caffeine but I don't think so. The last time this happened I had a week of really bad dreams about an ex-boyfriend of mine who was being exceedingly mean, and it got to the point where I didn't want to sleep because I didn't want to dream about him being mean anymore. But there are no bad dreams this time. Mostly it feels like...procrastination. Possibly my worst habit; in fact, sometimes I worry I will procrastinate my entire life away, with a college friend's words echoing in my ears: "I could have wasted my time in much better ways". And it's weird because I have a list a mile long of things I want to do (or need to do...), but I cannot get any of it done to save my life. It's not just finishing knitting projects or cleaning out the fridge, either; it's stuff that is really important to me, like my writing projects. I'm avoiding them big-time. I don't know why.

The other thing is, my hair has been giving me fits. It's too long now, to the point where about all I can do is put it in a ponytail. I fantasize about taking my pinking scissors to my ponytail, just to see what would happen. While I'm not a big drinker anyway, I am currently avoiding all alcohol just so that I don't act on the scissor impulse. It's a pretty strong compulsion, actually; even just writing about it is making me think about those scissors, which I happen to know are on the dining room table. The problem is that every time I cut my hair short I hate it and instantaneously regret it. But...wow. Just...chop. So tempting...

Photo Update

1) First, a kitty update. Callie has settled in, and recently I sprung for one of those cat tree thingamajigs because she seemed like she was a little bored. She's one of those cats that is immune to catnip, which I discovered after buying a slew of new toys for her. She just looks at the toys, then looks at me as if to say, "What on earth am I supposed to do with this?". Same with balls. So I thought one of these would give her a place to play. Instead, after it took her three days to figure out she could get inside it, it became her favorite place to nap. Just don't get too close -- she's keeping an eye on you:

And speaking of trouble...she's not happy about the whole wrapping presents concept:

I suspect this is my fault, as in my quest to entertain/exercise her, we started playing a game that has come to be called "Smackdown". The one toy she likes is a fishing-pole style toy -- a long plastic stick with a string, and a fuzzy toy at the end of the string. Callie doesn't care about the fuzzy toy or the string...she likes the stick. The stupid plastic stick. And she likes it best when I hide the stick under paper or a sheet, so she can attack it. She smacks it repeatedly with her paws, and then when she really gets going she starts racing around and pouncing. Now, before you call the ASPCA, I am exceedingly careful with this, and I don't let her play this without me, as it is all too obvious she could really hurt herself (poke herself in the eye, etc.). I don't let her chew on the stick, and don't let her grab onto it. She just bats it around with her paws.

2) Thanksgiving was really low-key this year. We were up at my parents' in Maine, and the day after Thanksgiving it snowed. Not a lot, but enough for one very determined 8-year old to build a "snow deer" with her father. Note the leftover dinner rolls used as ears and nose:

3) Knitting. There has been an inordinate amount of knitting mittens around here. Alas, the knitting has been accompanied by a ridiculous amount of un-knitting. I knit this mitten for my 10-year old niece J. (from the new Cascade 220 book), using yarn she had picked out. Stupidly, I thought that knitting the mittens just as the pattern instructed would result in mittens that would fit J. I was, alas, hugely mistaken. Thankfully, I only knit one of them, and this one fits her mother (my sister). So not all was lost. But it's taken me several tries to rework the pattern in order to get something that fits J., and that's where the ripping out has come in. I *will* figure this out though!




Meanwhile, I had my own mittens to knit. For the past two years I have knit myself mittens, with matching hats. And for the past two years, I have lost what I have knit. Come spring, these things just disappear. I assume I've left them on the train, but they never turn up in the lost-and-found.


This year, I had a picture of exactly what I wanted in my head, but couldn't find a written pattern so....well....I winged it. And all was good until I got to the increasing part. You'd think I would have anticipated this, it's not like I haven't knit mittens before, but no. Totally didn't occur to me that my two black/one red scheme would get thrown out of whack when more stitches were added. So, there was a lot of "improvising" (also known as, "screw it, its yarn, what's the worst that could happen?"). Ultimately these were a pretty quick knit, but I was honestly *this close* to ripping them out because I didn't like the way they tapered off. In the midst of my indecision, it got cold out, and that was the end of the deliberating. Plus, since it's stranded knitting, they are really warm!

My New Hero: The Gentleman from Vermont

Catching Up, Part 1

Oh, my poor little blog, neglected these past few weeks in the flurry of holiday preparations, in addition to the usual obligations – work, family, guitar lessons, cat cuddling. There has been sewing and knitting and even a couple of finished projects, which I need to get posted soon. These include a wonky but warm pair of mittens and a scarf that had long malingered in the UFO pile. But I’m determined to catch up here this week, even if it means a smattering of rapid-fire posts.

Normally, November is a terrible month for me; however, this year I seem to be sailing along quite nicely. I’m not sure why, but I’ve been feeling quite content lately. Uncharacteristically content, to be frank, to the point where my inner hypochondriac is starting to wonder what on earth is wrong with me. I'm feeling more "me" than I have in years, and I must say that I'm quite happy about it. That's not to say everything is going well (for example, my car got sideswiped in Providence a few weeks ago), it's just that I don't constantly feel like the Peanuts character PigPen, surrounded by a cloud of dust and doom.

A lot of this change has to do with the fact that I started the year following The Happiness Project, and while it didn’t turn out the way I had thought it would, I definitely feel like I’m in a much better place than I was 11 months ago. Here are my top 5 reasons why:

1) New job. I've written before about how the focus for The Happiness Project in March was work, and how it catapulted me into finding a new job. And truly, I’m so happy to be back in a small nonprofit organization again, working with people I genuinely like and who are committed to our mission and are not motivated by their own egos. And, the lack of bureaucracy has enabled me to submit 26 grants in 4 months PLUS write and mail an end-of-year fundraising appeal (not usually my bailiwick), so I’m feeling ridiculously productive. While the commute still stinks, my stress levels have plummeted and I *so* needed that.

2) New kitty. Adopting Calypso, or Callie as she has come to be called around here, has been such a great thing for me (in spite of the tapeworm incident). It's odd because she is the complete antithesis of Wilbert, my niece’s cat that I cat-sit for two years: he loves catnip, she is immune; he loves having people around, she hides whenever someone comes to visit; he hates being held, she cuddles up and purrs any time she can. It’s the latter quality that I love so much, particularly when I get home after a long train ride. She jumps up and snuggles right into the left side of my neck, nuzzling my face and purring loudly, and it’s a great thing to come home to. Plus, she will actually drink out of a bowl, rather than insisting the bathtub faucet be permanently set to drip.

3) Guitar. While it is still a struggle, and I still have a very long way to go, I am finally getting to the point where I can play music now. And it makes me inordinately happy to be able to sit down and strum chords. It has been shockingly difficult to learn a new instrument as an adult, but I’m glad I did. And I'm glad I didn't quit this summer when I really, really wanted to!

4) Nieces and nephew. This is the first time I’ve lived close by to them (roughly a 20 minute drive), and it’s been so great. I get to see them almost every weekend, and I love being able to spend time with them, and be a part of their lives (even if it did mean sitting through several cold and rainy middle-school football games this year!). And it's been great to have my sister back here, too.

5) Speaking of rain, I’m going to Ireland for my birthday next year! After a series of awful birthdays, I was determined that this next one be really good – particularly since I’m turning *gulp* 40. My best friend from college, who turns 40 a week after I do, is coming with me, which is a HUGE thing since she is married and has a child. Because of that, we’re not going for very long (we leave on a Sunday and come back on a Friday), and we're doing a tour because neither of us dared try driving on the other side of the road, but still: we’re going!

So that's the best of the good stuff. I'll be back over the next few days to catch up on craft projects and update on some of the "still needs work" parts of my Happiness Project!

Rant

This whole air travel flack has me really wound up. Truth be told, I haven’t flown in several years – I think the last time was in 2006 – but I used to fly fairly regularly, first because I was living in Memphis and then because of work. Frankly, I’ve always felt like the post 9/11 security was nothing more than an inconvenient joke. For one thing, a few months after 9/11 I flew home for Thanksgiving with a huge pair of sewing shears in my carry-on luggage – I didn’t know they were there, and they were never found by security. But they could have done some damage in the wrong hands. And yet: the last time I flew I had a set of size-1 bamboo double-pointed needles (basically a couple of long tooth picks!) taken away from me on my return trip, despite the fact that I was allowed to fly with them just a few days prior, and despite the fact that if you tried to poke someone with them they would most likely have snapped in two.

I’ve also had some less-than-positive interactions with TSA agents. Once at Logan, changing planes to fly to Portland, I was confused about why I had to go through another security screening; I was genuinely unsure if I was in the right place, but the agent threatened to arrest me when I asked him why I had to be rescreened (he didn’t like my “tone”, whatever that meant). Another agent once dumped my prescription medication (in its original bottle, with my name and prescription info on it) out on a dirty table to make sure there weren’t any “illicit” drugs in there, spilling some onto the floor. I can understand maybe opening the bottle, but at least have some reasonably clean place if you are going to dump it out! (She picked them all up and put them back in the bottle “because she had to”; I threw them out and got a replacement from the pharmacy, which incidentally was a pain and required authorization from my doctor in order for the insurance to pay for it again. And I'm aware that I was lucky to have insurance!)

But mainly I’m wound up because I’ve had exactly two parking tickets in my lifetime and that is the extent of my “criminal” activity, but I’m supposed to feel safe because they are making ME take my shoes off?

The truth is, we’re spending millions if not billions of dollars to screen thousands of innocent people on a daily basis. And we are (apparently) not even marginally safer than we were pre -9/11. And now, we’re putting innocent people through machines that may or may not be safe, and we’re letting the TSA literally stick their hands down the pants of innocent people in front of their children (I’m not making this up; my nieces and nephew watched as a TSA agent did this to their father on a recent trip). We’re forcing the pilots who fly the planes through the same idiotic procedures, despite the fact that if a pilot wanted to destroy an aircraft, all he/she would have to do is, y’know, crash the plane (these people need to watch The Event!).

This is supposedly all legitimate because when you buy your airline ticket you are presumed to give up certain rights. First, I just bought a plane ticket for travel and at no time was I ever told, “by purchasing this ticket you give up your right to unreasonable search and seizure”. Second of all, really??? To me, the most reasonable comparison is to road blocks set up for drunk drivers. Drunk driving is a serious threat to the public good; I can tell you right now that infinitely more people die from drunk drivers each year than are affected by terrorists blowing up airplanes. So fine, we accept that it is legal for the police to conduct random checkpoints. You go through the checkpoint, you give the cop your license, and unless s/he has reason to believe you have been drinking, you get waived through. But each driver is NOT routinely taken out of their vehicle and frisked, or forced to take a breathalyzer, or strip searched. Can you imagine???

But we let the TSA railroad us into believing we’re safer because every day they frisk and/or radiate thousands of innocent people, who in any other circumstance a police officer would have absolutely NO just cause to search? Honestly, these shenanigans make me feel even LESS safe, because it tells me they honestly have no clue how to stop the real terrorists. And THAT is what really terrifies me.

What if it was my family that got blown up? I think about that question a lot, and let me be clear: I'm not at all advocating for ditching passenger screening entirely. The problem is, from what I can tell these new procedures may still enable a real terrorist to make it through. I heard on a news program last night that during a training exercise, TSA agents confiscated a bottle of water, but missed a bomb right beneath it. That hardly gives me faith in the system. But bigger (philosophical) picture here: one of the fundamental tenants of American jurisprudence is that it is better to let a guilty man go free than to persecute an innocent man. But that’s kind of what these regulations do. And why is that ok?