This month has been hard. Last month was hard. Really this whole year has been hard and it depends really on just how long you’ve been paying attention that it’s been hard.
One of the things that’s been hard for me is writing. I don’t like giving that much up, of a sentence – I try to always stay ahead of the curve, I try to make sure that at the best of times you have no idea how much or how little I write from day to day. Well, today I’m coming off four days of not even being able to commit an idea to paper. That’s bad. Normally even if an idea doesn’t work when I start on it, I put it in a hopper and it becomes an article, later. Eventually. I can get some work done. Tiny steps are steps.
But it’s been hard to even do that.
Part of this is just presence. I’m surprised by this, but I find I write really well when I’m alone. When I’m not alone, people in the house impose their own needs on the house, which is totally reasonable, and we’re all just trying to get along right now. It makes recording audio harder, that’s an easy one. Oh, and it also means our neighbours are around more, and so are their pets, which means Elli, our pet, is more prone to causing fuss, which means that recording can be interrupted by the dog.
There’s a surprising amount of work I do when it’s quiet? waking up of a morning, putting on some relaxing audio and reading books for an hour or two, which surprises me as how much of a boring bastard I’ve become and how much I enjoy that, It’s also meant that time when I could churn out a few thousand words in a morning is now down to taking all day to write maybe half that. That’s really rough, especially as someone who prides himself on his productivity, his ability to create in any circumstances and dealing with pressures.
Also I have to be available to take opportunities. Sometimes, I get the chance to go to the store for an emergency supply when a friend is driving past our house and willing to do the pickup/dropoff for us. That means that I may have 2 hours of uninterrupted time to work, but that time is taken up, in part, by not being available to work. Just in case.
Here’s another thing, though: Everyone around me matters so much more than any piddling thing I’m writing. I started on an Ikoria set review until I realised I barely wanted to talk about four cards, because I kept getting distracted talking to a family member about things that they were interested in, things that mattered more. Every evening now I’m talking about playing board games or sharing videogames with Fox, because uh, every night now we are keenly aware of spending our time together.
This sucks, nobody is working well, and I’m just wanting to make it clear I am not immune. This is awful.
And now, saying that, I’ve been able to belt out 500 words. I’ve been able to get something done. And that’s… a start. That’s something. With that in mind, I pick myself up, and I start work on the next thing, because the next thing is what’s next.