Spring Break Procrastination

Sometimes I like to think of catchy, cute blog post titles. Today is not that kind of day. I'm lazy. In fact, I've had the laziest weekend I can remember in a very long time. Partially because it's spring break for me at Chatham. Also because my boyfriend has been really busy at work so we've not had tons of time to chat. In these kinds of times I begin to realize why I'm so busy all the time: because if I'm not busy, I'm not productive. I've basically laid in bed for the last four days straight, save for brunch with my folks yesterday and an Oscar party last night. I did go to work today, but here I am back in bed when I just realized I forgot about a doctor's appointment I had at 5pm. Normal, overworked, overly busy, stressed out Laura would have remembered. But lazy, somewhat lonely, slightly despressed Laura eats chips and dip in bed while watching hours of SNL reruns on Hulu.

The thing is, I have a ton of work to do. I have two huge research papers due in the next few weeks. I have so much to read for class. I have lesson plans to write for work and for a class. Perhaps I am frozen under the weight of all I need to accomplish. Mostly I am guessing I'll just get it done another time and it's more fun to watch TV.

Writing this blog post is the most work I've done (other than teach) all day. I now have actually scared myself into starting some of my school work. Here goes nothing.

Are you as busy as I am?

It's unclear whether Outer Space is as busy as I am right now. Perhaps that fact that it hasn't answered yet is a sign of it being preoccupied with the stuff of space: creating supernovas, swallowing objects into black holes, and being infinite. The outer stuff of my life has also moved into full orbit these days. Work is picking up speed as I start some new projects with my students. Grad classes are full-speed-ahead with lots of writing and reading. Even my personal life is moving along after my successful solo trip to NYC and an upcoming adventure to California to visit the boy.

This past week I have also noticed my inner life take a stressful turn. It seems that during the most sacred part of my day, bedtime, my thoughts take on a never-ending stream-of-consciousness momentum. I lay in bed, trying to relax, focusing on my breathing, and progressively relaxing muscles. But the thoughts stay. They seem to have no where to go, so they stay inside my head bouncing off my brain and showing up in my tense shoulders each morning after a night of terrible sleep. That is, if I fall asleep. I've ended up averaging around 5 hours for the past few days. It all came to fruition Thursday evening (which is like my Friday) when I had what was probably the worst stress headache ever, and I skipped class to rest. But sleep would not come. I woke up Friday morning when my alarm, which I forgot to turn off the night before, went off at 6:45am and I could not fall back to sleep.

As someone with an attention disorder, I have learned that medication can only take me so far. So that's where my behavior changes come into play. I've set up my life in such a way that I can accomplish things with minimal distractions. I am highly organized, I don't have a lot of stuff around and I know myself well enough to manage my environment so that I can be most productive. This includes making sure I'm well rested, because being tired, hungry, itchy, sweaty, dirty, messy, cranky, or wired will set me off course.

I don't give myself enough credit though. I can focus. Even if I am a little [insert adjective]. Just as long as I am doing more than one thing at a time. If I'm reading, I should also be highlighting and taking notes. If I'm writing a blog post, I am also relaxing my shoulders with a hot compress. When I'm on the phone I'm constantly tidying up. Multitasking is my best friend.

I think this is why writing feels natural to me as a form of expression. Writing is multitasking. Even as I'm typing these words I'm thinking about what I'll be saying next. When I'm editing the line breaks in that poem I'm thinking about the beginning and the end, the shape, sound and hidden meaning. When composing an autobiographical essay, I've got all this material swirling around inside my head just waiting to be pulled out of orbit and put on the page.

Maybe that is where my sleep deprivation lies. All that time spent tossing and turning, wishing sleep to come, I should instead just get up and write. Even if it just means making a list of things to remember. This is part of the experience of living-like-a-writer; being willing to know yourself well enough to throw it all out the window and risk being tired the next day, because perhaps what you have to say at 1am needs to be put down, even if it only leads to sleep. Even if no one else ever reads it. That act of putting words down even at the most inconvenient times will mean the difference between being just someone who writes now and then and being a writer.

Oh right, it's a new decade

So I survived my first semester of graduate school. Now, while I'm in a two year program, I'm also taking classes in the early summer and late summer semesters. If I combine the summer sessions into one semester, that means I have five more left until I finish. The countdown begins.

Truth be told, I kind of never want to leave my MFA. So far, having all this time to devote to my writing has proven to be worthwhile. I've really strengthened my poetry muscles and I didn't have a full workshop this semester, so just thinking about the spring makes me a little bouncy.

I've also learned a lot about teaching. Not just from my job, but also about the particular issues associated with teaching a creative process. This will be endlessly fascinating to me. I never thought about how my education did not foster my creative writing abilities. Writing was a fun pass time, a hobby, but not something I could pursue as a career. I'm so glad to pursue it now. I so much enjoyed my pedagogy class. It also turns out that my undergraduate degree in education was not a waste. It not only got me a fantastic teaching job, but also really connected me with the community. I also noticed that other MFA-ers really envied my job, which was a surprise, considering I was going into this terrified that I would be so far behind without an English degree. Turns out, I've just got different strengths and experiences.

Wow. I just realized how much I grew over these past few months. I was terrified to start teaching and to start grad school. I knew I could handle either thing individually, but both together was uber-scary. Plus managing Weave and having a personal life (sort of) just added to the pressure. Not only did I do it but I also managed some serious personal stress and grief without losing my head.

I also got a paid writing gig today. Woot!

Overall, 2009 started off pretty bad for me all around and has improved tremendously as the months went on. Losing my grandfather a couple of weeks ago certainly has changed my overall assessment of this year (honestly, it still doesn't even make sense to me). However, he would not want his death to negate the good things in my life. I know he was proud of me and so I should be proud of myself too. Go Laura!

Happy New Year folks. I think I'm in love 2010 already.

Writing and Procrastination

I've been thinking a bit about art, creativity and procrastination. It seems to me that I work best under pressure and I know this is true of a lot of creative people I know. In fact, most writers tell me they absolutely need deadlines to keep themselves motivated. As I enter finals week, I have a lot of work to get done still (although, to be fair I am relatively well prepared going into my last week), but clearly pressure does do something for me too.

There are, of course, other conditions under which people write profusely. Take writing and emotional expression. I'm fascinated by work that comes out of people in very authentic ways, like after a traumatic experience or a particularly emotional life transition. Art that comes from the voices of the oppressed doesn't have a deadline, but rather, a mission. It's still a pressure, but an internal motivation that spurs creativity, rather than the external motivation of expectation like deadlines. Perhaps these highly emotional conditions are a natural condition in which to create art.

My musings lead me to wonder whether procrastinating is really simply a form of creating these intense emotional conditions in which to produce work. I know I will eventually get it done, but why do it now when I can work my ass off later? Our modern lives have so many contraptions that do things for us so we have more time to do other things, but we end up bored. We end up in affairs. We end up picking a fight with our brother. We end up staying out all night the day before the big presentation at work. We end up in car accidents.

We end up in graduate school.

This is all perhaps just a nice excuse for me to blog when I should be working on my research paper. Just helps me justify my procrastinating.