Friday, October 23, 2009

On the overwhleming nature of too much to do.


So I move to Aspen next Saturday. That means I have seven days until I get in my car and drive there. There are many things that I should get done before I go... and for some reason, I've decided that the best way to get that stuff done is to sit down and write a blog post... because I've read everything on Facebook and on my Tweet Deck...

Here's the deal. I'm overwhelmed. Not with the idea of moving, I'm ready to move. In fact, I wish it was moving day. I have felt for the last month like I'm spinning my wheels, just killing time until I can start my new life. And I think that my love of a crushing deadline and my desire not to be in the situation I'm in here at home anymore is making me myopic to the day of the move, unless I'm engaged in my kids, I'm focusing down the tube to the day I leave. Which isn't helpful as far as moving toward getting gone.

I think I also don't relish the fact that once I'm gone, I'm having to trust that everything will be okay here. Letting go of the kids for a few weeks is even harder than I thought, and with so many SO Many unresolved issues, I feel like I can't put my head down and get to work because there is so much obstinately unresolved crap. And its time to take the bull by the horns and hammer out how this is all going to work, because the constant change of plan is making me feel like I'm standing on a keyboard and someone else is playing the paino.

Honestly, I'm excited to be in my own place, living on my own, standing on my own two feet, making my own money, starting over, turning a page, as it were.

I'm overwhelmed with the fact that there's a week to go, and I wish I'd gone through the barn the attic and the garage all summer like I was going to... but didn't really have time or energy to.

This business of divorce is very tiring. It takes up a lot more time than I ever thought it would, and I'd love to write more about it, the ups and downs and what its been like, but I can't do that right now, so there is all this... silence about this huge part of my life, this giant, emotional and time-sucking thing, like swimming upstream through slow molasses.

This is another reason I'm excited to get outa dodge, we both need some space, here, and living on top of one another in the same house has not made this any easier.

What I need to do is make a list of everything I need to do, in all categories, not just of my appointments, and make a performance plan, essentially, to make sure I get it all done before I go. (And here I hear my little sister, who is a workflow expert, saying "Lists don't work!" and she's right, but I gotta do something, because I'm getting nothing done fast except preemptively missing my kids and Mike and his kids.)

But I want to sit at my computer and write and play with my boys in ooblick and make cookies with them, and then next Saturday, just wander out to my car, turn it on, and go to Aspen.

Its not often that I turn my face away from hard work, I'm a fan of running at the thing that scares me, or running at the thing that needs tackling, I find that when you go at it, it gets done sooner, and when you look away, it grows, and sometimes it grows legs and follows you around.

The funny thing is that I also have a bunch of stuff that doesn't need to get done before I go, but needs doing. And I'm gonna loose this awesome enormous iMac that I work on when I leave, and have my old, slow, broken PowerBook to work off when I'm down there, so I feel like I should knock a bunch of computer stuff off the list, too... I had this grand idea that I'd buy one off Ebay for $500, but that's another dream on hold, because money is still tight, and that's okay, the computer I have will make it.

Wishing it was different is taking the energy I need to make it happen. What is now? What is in the now? What is my reality that I need to face, handle, and walk through, no matter how inconvenient, unknown, scary, painful... seven days to do it all.

And its time to get started. Now.

1 comment:

Jongira said...

Freudian typo #425? -> "someone else is playing the paino"
(sings) "...pain-o, pain-o...
she had many a mile to go that night
before she reached the pain-o".

October is a good time for transitions. Great good fortune! - J