SquarePeg Books

Sometimes everything has to fall to shit so you can put things back together in a way that works.

October kinda rammed that down my throat. Not as quickly as September of this year or July 2018, but enough to slow my butt down and make me consider things.

Being trapped at your in-laws away from everyone like a troll in the basement because of COVID will do that, I suppose.

I could’ve read, caught up on email, or a few other things but I didn’t.

It was generally me, YouTube and a rough draft that I’d brought on the off chance that I would have time.

When I first went to my in-laws, it was for an assumed medical situation that they needed help with, that looked nothing like COVID. I thought I’d be there for a week, maybe. Two at the outside. that should give the rest of the family space to plan out the next steps.

Well, three days later the next steps turned into a positive COVID test for them and a few days later for me as well. On the plus side, their COVID was treated with anti-viral horse pills and that seemed to clear up the other issues everyone was worried about.

On the down side, I’m young enough and strong enough at 46 that I’m told to just suck it up and sweat it out.

I got home this past Friday night and I’m still wiped out. Not because the work after the first week was particularly onerous, but because I was constantly resisting finding other work around their house for me to do. My head was constantly buzzing with ALL THE THINGS THAT NEED TO BE DONE TO MAKE THINGS BETTER.

But I had to wear a mask and stay in the basement as much as possible so I didn’t reinfect them, which curtailed my movement quite a bit. Forcing me to slow down.

Some days it felt like a complete stop.

I’d had foot surgery this past June and I spent most of a month trapped in bed, but that was nothing like this.

That I could pretend to plan – I could surround myself with all number of activities in my house to do (that I mostly did not do, mainly because the painkillers were pretty good). In the months since, I’ve made progress on another of other things that are not related to writing.

I told myself I was clearing the decks, removing the distractions from writing.

Except I kept finding yet another thing to do that was clearly not writing nor necessary to get done right now, ahead of the writing.

Always another thing.

In my in-laws basement, there were no other things.

In my in-laws basement I had to confront my manuscript just to feel semi-productive. The one I dreaded working on because I while I know where its going,its taken a life of its own, so I’m not sure how to make it advance in that direction. The binder of printed out pages just waiting to be scribbled all over in red pen and highlighters and sticky notes.

I made pretty good progress, considering the conditions and how much I’d told myself I didn’t want to work on it.

Now I’m home. Now I’m in an environment in which the nervous energy, the constantly keeping one ear open for a call for help, the relentless vision of what all has to be done in order for good forward progress to be made, are not in my face.

Now I’m tired.

But now it feels like I can reschedule my days to put in for writing first, other activities second (after the next nap, you understand – I’m quite run-down).

What a novel concept.

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