I’ve been surfing–well, that is entirely the wrong word–puddling round the Internet for an hour, trying to distract myself into writing something, knowing that the minute I stop typing, I’ll have to face down the last few devotionals that are sticking in my proverbial craw. (What is a craw anyway?)
Did you know I’m working on a book? Truly I am. I wrote it suddenly last year, in some kind of spasmodic fit, and I’ve been gently toiling away with some noble and brilliant editors who have painstakingly, you’ll be happy to know, helped me deal with my failures of commas and general inadequacy.
“I’m so stressed out and overwhelmed,” I lamented last week, waving my arms and sneezing violently from all the dust. “Why can’t I get my life together!?”
“Well,” said my mother philosophically, “you did just drive around the country, and you’re moving house, and you’re writing a book. Most people don’t do all those things at the same time.”
“But the book’s already written,” I muttered bitterly, “it just needs wrapping up. Everyone else would already be done and moved and saving orphans.”
So instead of wrapping it up, I laboriously KonMarie-d my dresser drawers and winter clothes. And then I had tea with a lot of friends. And then I went to Aldi. And then I make an Einkorn Toad in the Hole. And then I took a walk around our lovely neighborhood park and pointed out to the children all the people playing Pokemon Go and taunted them about the lack of smartphones in their hands. And then I emptied some more boxes.
Tragically, though, today I do have a bit of a free morning. Every kind of appointment has been cleared away. If I don’t plant myself at my desk and just Finish Already it will be true and undeniable avoidance, and not because I just have to do a couple of more boxes so that we can survive. I could just easily do it, and still have all kinds of time for putting things away.
But if I did? Then what? What happens to me when I complete this whole project (which, don’t worry, won’t be today) and it is sitting there all wrapped up with a bow in actual touchable pages, ready to be shoved in a cupboard and forgotten about? I’d have to write something else, wouldn’t I? But what on earth would it be?
Somehow, finishing this book without having started to write anything else feels like looking dolefully down into a catestrophic abyss. It’s like having to think about whether to vote for Donald or Hillary. It’s the end of the world. Therefore, I’m sure I should put it off just one more day.
Oh look! Sunshine! I could go examine my garden. And boil myself an egg. And then tidy my desk. Pip pip.
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