A confession: I’m letting Book Two, just a poor little baby manuscript, suffer. She’s been an estimated 90% done for about four months now, and I just cannot bring myself to do that last 10%. That almost certainly means there’s something wrong with what I think the last 10% should be, because that’s what books do when they’re trying to stop you from ruining them. But I can’t even bring myself to do the work to find out what it is that needs fixing.
Maybe the problem is that I doomed her from the beginning. I started her off saying that I didn’t care how she turned out; that she was just practice; that I didn’t expect to do anything with her no matter how she turned out. Upon reflection, what an unkind way to treat an idea. What would Liz Gilbert say?
I mean (for effect, pretend I’m contorting myself into a classic observational-comedy standup pose, leaning wryly on a mic stand) talk about “kill your darlings!” For what I said about this little book they oughta lock me up and call me a murderer!
We live in Peak Content. It’s a time of an ever-shifting, ravenously demanding zeitgeist. After all, do you want to see your grandchildren’s faces when you told them that you slept right through the Golden Age of Television without fully appreciating it? I think not.
But on top of Peak Content (please sing that phrase to the tune of “On Top of Old Smoky”), we’re also now in lockdown or stay-at-home or shelter-in-place or quarantine or whatever we’re deciding to call it. And I’m noticing that a lot of Content is requesting even more of my attention.
From every corner of Instagram and Facebook, every friend group, every streaming service, every book seller, every website, every podcast, come siren songs: “Join me in your idleness! Attend to my whole back catalog! Log on as I go live every evening for a half hour! For two hours! Read a long book with the local library on Zoom! Watch a movie live with Diane Rehm!* After all, you have a lot of time right now!”
*To my knowledge this has not been offered yet, but I preemptively accept.
You’ve heard it before, folks: a nutritious breakfast is so good for your health that skipping it is basically a crime against the body. Plus, what excuse do you have these days to not finally embrace the art of the most important meal of the day?
(If you’re an essential worker, share this post with anyone living in your household, two-legged or four-, and tell them to get to work. You, my friend, need a thank-you omelet).
I’m going to make myself an elegant fried-egg sandwich while we chat.
“Good morning, this is Dating,” says the perky voice. “How may I help you?”
“So, this is about a guy,” he says cautiously. “We’ve been seeing each other for—well, it depends how you count, I guess, but like, four months?”
“Okay, amazing, I need you to slow down and tell me literally everything.”
He lets out a nervous chuckle. “Really? I thought you would just need…”
She giggles. “No, I’m so interested! This is my favorite part of the job. I love hearing about people’s stories. But also, yes,” she says, soberly, “I do need the information to process your claim.”
It’s not that I don’t like old stuff; in fact, I’m a huge cheesy fan of it, generally. But something about antique stores depresses me. I can’t stop thinking along one of two tracks: either I get overwhelmed at the massive glut of stuff that just continues to exist, oceans of kitsch upon kitsch, from decade after decade, and this crap is the cream of the crop! Masses of useless material, flotsam crowding the tide of the Earth.
It’s been the last time for a while for some things, yes. But some are starting, or starting over.
It’s the first time in a while for cherry blossoms snowing down onto the grass and onto my head. Petals on a wet black bough.
The first time in a while for windows open all day and into the evening, for birdsong carried into the house on a breeze tinged with flower blooms and fried chicken. Shouts of children, and wild men, and women who exercise with their faraway friends through a laptop in the sunny courtyard.
The first time in a while for the first flush of tender neon leaves shouting at the sky in the forest canopy.
The first time in a while for long walks in the middle of the day, near the end of the day, getting muddied and lost in the neighborhood national park, watching the black lab throw himself into and into and into the water for the ball.
The first time in a while for strangers passing at a distance, eyes meeting, not daring to breathe, except to whisper, thank you for your kindness. Not wondering what they mean.
It’s the first time in a while for dusting down the tops of the books in the bookshelf, because it’s there to do, and the light is falling in through the window right on it. You wouldn’t usually be there to see it.
The first time in a while to catch up with that one person. It’s been nine years, can you believe it?
It might be too soon to say this, since we’re somewhere in the middle. But I’m struck by remembering that afternoon a few weeks ago when I pulled my suitcase four miles across town.
The world had changed for me in the previous 48 hours. 48 hours before, I had been willing to ride the metro, to get in a cab, to go to work, to see a friend. Now I was not.
And as I walked, I was aware that I was seeing things happening for the last time in a while. Did everyone else know?
How often is it, after all, that you know it’s the last time? Most things change so subtly, and those that change fast often do so without warning. We are living in that strange aberration now: a quick change we saw coming as it rode us down.
That afternoon was the last time, for a while, that I saw groups of kids meandering home from school in clusters on the sidewalk sharing bags of corner-store chips with unwashed hands.
Hey, do you want to be awake, though? I know it’s 2:25 am, but I thought now might be a great time for us to reconnect. It’s been…
Ahem. Hey. Have you ever thought about that one really embarrassing but also still heartbreaking thing that happened years ago?
Oh, you have? And now you’re awake? Welcome! So sorry to pull that trick, but I missed you.
Yeah, so, do you want to think for a while about that embarrassing/heartbreaking thing? We can definitely ruminate on that until about 3:30. As you know, that’s more or less my specialty.
Or, if you prefer, I could bring up your Rolodex of old grudges and we can just flip through that sucker until dawn. Ha. Do you remember Rolodexes? I do. I’m glad you do too, now. Want to think about that for a while?
Oh, you’re still stuck on that embarrassing/heartbreaking thing? Sorry about that. But if that’s what you’re into, I can definitely serve you up lots of details about all the terrible stuff that happened that somehow doesn’t seem bad at all when you think about it by daylight but at this time of night is like unimaginably awful. Cool?
And also hypotheticals! Like maybe we can think about what if everyone else is still out there thinking about that thing too? Like, what if everyone else equally remembers the thing and talks behind your back about how embarrassing and also sad that was for you!
See, I’m here to serve. Maybe we can also imagine some really cutting, elegant speeches you could give to those people who are definitely all still really focused on that thing about you, and you can completely demolish them.
Wait, what are you doing? Are you trying those relaxation techniques again? Honey, you know that doesn’t work on me. I’m still over here. Maybe I can bring up that old annoyance again? That really got you going last time. Or, ooh, maybe I can give you some really paralyzing fresh anxieties? Like what if everyone you love suddenly…
Ha! I knew the relaxation techniques couldn’t take me out.
I mean, hiiiii, you’re back! I know you hate it when I do that but baby this is just what I do. I like to spend time with you. And you are always so busy during waking times, either working or doing your projects or consuming Content, that we don’t get all that much time for me to just chat at you.
I mean, chat with you. How are you doing, by the way? I feel like I’ve just been blah blah blah, talking a blue streak, sorry! But right now I have lots of ideas I really think I ought to share with you about how you can improve that piece of writing you’ve been working on. Do you want to get your phone out and take detailed notes? No? Okay, I’ll just repeat them over and over so you’ll be sure to remember when you wake up.
Hey, I can see you’re trying a body scan, and you’ve already made it up to your knees. You must want to get rid of me pretty badly. It’s a little past three. I get it. I’ve heard you say that you don’t “like it” when you’re “exhausted.” I want to find a happy medium for us.
Say, what about this? Want to think about what it would be like to ride a dolphin while it’s porpoising? Imagine hanging on as it leaps high out of the water and splashes down into the sunlit sea. So fast and so exhilarating! Look at the sparkles on the water. Feel the swells rushing by you, and the power of the dolphin as it kicks and dips. But how would you hold on? Yeah, let’s think about that for a long time. How would you hold on?
Yeah, good idea, sugar, you probably should immediately write out that dolphin idea. And while you’re at it, I have several more I’d like you to jot down. This shouldn’t take more than two hours or so.
After waking up, the next thing that happens is work. Is this ideal? God knows. But as we established, in this time it is possible to wake up at any late hour, and it is also possible (even patriotic and good) to stay in bed and just get right on that laptop.
Night bleeds into day, and we clock in.
Here’s how it happened to me:
DAY ONE: I am bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. I put on clothing, sit on a chair, and open the laptop. I look at the emails. They seem to be written in Greek, or perhaps in some forgotten abyssal tongue. I know some of these words but I have no idea of how they hook together. I don’t know how to do my job. I fake it by moving documents around and using as much jargon as I can muster. There is synergy; there is circling back; there is blue-skying; there is right-sizing. Thusly, like an octopus inking a predator and skedaddling, I buy myself some time to remember what the hell it is I did Before.
Day Two: No need to overdo it. Laptop in pajamas. I could have the TV on. There’s probably no law against that. I could do all manner of things—procrastibaking some brownies, playing a video game, reading all the news, cleaning the counters, reorganizing the closet, lying on the floor for quite a long time. I panic at 3pm and furiously work until 5:30. This reminds me, bittersweetly, of the daily post-procrastination panic back at the office Before, and I am left in a strange funk.
Day Three: It’s a new day. No more of that time-wasting. I have made myself an hour-by-hour schedule:
7-8: draft today’s post
8-9: emails
9-10: Work Task 1
10-11: stretching, breathing exercises, staring out the window
11-12: Work Task 2
12-1: lunch
1-2: Work Task 2 (overflow)
2-3: walk
3-5: finish work tasks, close out day
5-6: yoga
6-?: make homemade hand sanitizer like a true prepper, read a book, free time, contact everyone I know, contemplate existence, plan the next novel I write, clean the floors, etc.
Day Three is basically perfect. I’m thriving. This is living. This is balancing work with life in a sustainable, healthy, human, vibrant way. I can keep this up forever. Eureka!
Day Four: I don’t remember Day Four. Somehow I ended up covered in chip crumbs and it was dark outside.
Day Five: The same as Day Three, but I overslept. I follow the schedule, but in a random order and make sure to switch tasks every two minutes (highly recommended).
And now, somehow it is the weekend again. It feels as though it has been about twenty minutes since Monday, but also somehow, twenty years.
