i am not a failure - so shut up you stupid little voice. . . SHUT UP

i haven't updated in a while.  and i was wondering how much of it was because i am embarrassed for my lack of progress OR how much of it is because i'm embarrassed for what i wish i was doing OR if i'm embarrassed because i don't feel happy about what i HAVE done (in terms of writing). . .

the fact is. . .i'm embarrassed and ashamed. embarrassed that i haven't updated, embarrassed that i haven't met my goals, ashamed that you should call me on it but if I write it down, then i'm open to you calling me on my shit. then ashamed that i don't want to be called on my shit. . . ugh, such a vicious circle.

these last two weeks were pretty rough.  you know when you say things - things you wish you hadn't said? and then all you do is dwell on those things and berate yourself.  it's total self-flagellation without even a good religious reason. . .and sometimes the things you said don't even warrant any second thought. . . so you beat yourself up because of that. . .ugh, such a vicious cycle.

so - last night i was looking at what i HAD done. . . and i have decided to cut myself some freakin' slack.

so here's an update -

today is Day 75 of the year and is the start of week 12. if i don't count anything i've written, i have consumed AT LEAST (aka - i have recorded it) SEVENTY-THREE (73) individual items of art.  i have read and/or listened essays, poems, short stories, novels and non-fiction. i have watched old movies and original plays and shows. these are things i recorded. that means, except for the last TWO days, i have consumed some form of art every day.

and i'm not even going to sell myself short there. i've also watched four oscar winning films, one ENTIRE season of a VERY cool BBC America tv show, several non-oscar nominated films that i never saw before, organized a baby shower, worked more than 40 hours per week, got my cat into the vet (and am learning how to give fluids. . .), and attended trivia, friend gatherings, a reading event, got the first part of my tattoo, bid and won an auction which led to a very wet, but still very awesome opening season game for the Sounders, signed up for another marathon, and started training, took apart a blanket i knitted (b/c, dude, it was lopsided) and restarted it and am one skein in, entertained a guest for oscar's weekend, i'm in the middle of another book and i listened to three new albums by two new to me groups and lastly, have helped to organize a very important (to me) get together about writing. . .

so - FUCK YOU stupid little voice telling me that i'm a failure. i'm not.

and if i look at what i have PRODUCED. . . it's week 12 - i've written 7 blog posts (including this one), 3 letters of more than 2500 words a piece to significant people in my life, 2 short stories, and 6 story ideas. i've also written 24 haikus (even if some of them are bad) and discussed a potential writing project with my friend and came up with a novel idea through a conversation with my mother. Not bad. . . more than one creative thing per week.

so - again - FUCK YOU STUPID LITTLE VOICE. i am not a failure.

caching my life force tokens

today was a reminder of how much i still have to grow as a person.  i believe days like today happen soley to knock me off my high horse. . . and was karmically capped off with Facebook telling me i am Darth Vader...

and actually, i'm not totally destroyed - which is sort of new.

but also, days like today also remind me how much i love what i do and how much i love the people around me and really, how much they love me back.


first - i have to say that i'm especially sensitive today to being irritated due to the healing of my most awesome tattoo - it itches so badly that i am concerned i might actually commit homicide if someone looks at me the wrong way - which would really be a waste of a homicide. . . if i'm gonna play that chip, i probably should make it count (for those of you that don't know me well, please note this is not actually a real concern). and part of this easily irritateable state is due to my (not public so don't ask me) endeavor to actually quit smoking. but didn't tell you that.

second - due to the most awesome best friend, i did not sleep a lot last night as i was out late belatedly celebrating my birthday at Aragona (i'm gonna have to write about that too).

third - i even PREDICTED yesterday that i would fail epically in a meeting today. and i did. epically.

fourth - i had to change my password - which, means i had to actually think - annoying

fifth - in and effort to give someone i work with a good surprise, i managed to lock him out of everything and make him a whole bunch of extra work without even notifying him that i was about to totally mess up his stuff - and then going to lunch and not noticing his calls - and he genuinely was happy to handle the chaos i created because i listened

sixth - i picked a fight with my boss without even meaning to

seventh - i sounded all "know-it-all" today - and wow, that girl is a bitch.

eighth - accidentally sending my back tattoo to the 11 year old daughter of one of my co-workers. . .she must have been terrified. . . and that could have gone all kinds of bad


BUT - so much happened too, that counteracted that shitty stuff.

exhibit a) Tiffany brought me chocolate because i was feeling so badly.

exhibit b) Julie came by after saving up the banana laffy taffys for me, which probably means she had to fend off very sugar crazed technologists

exhibit c) randomly going to lunch alone because i could not live without a burger and meeting Jason, Eric, Chris and Trish and having a wonderful time.

exhibit d) my boss coming to me and telling me how i might have approached today better and complimenting me on my ability to recognize my own failures

exhibit e) Scott asking me (after so many years) if he could glean any of my lessons about my current reading/writing goal (and he's a totally ridiculously scandalously talented and funny writer)

exhibit f) Melinda and i setting up lunch to talk before she finishes her book

exhibit g) getting tweets from Alexa about how i help inspire her (she has no idea how cool i think she is and to get those tweets is pretty fucking mind-blowing)

exhibit h) getting Darth Vader on Facebook (i mean seriously, i'm not so secretly fucking psyched that i'm vader - duh)

exhibit i) being passionate about my team and my work and still getting outraged at the inhumanity of it all when i could just be jaded

exhibit j) being ok about my failure today. i mean, at least i knew it would be a trigger and how i would be. and now, i can figure out how to not do that next time.

exhibit k) my actual ability to breath and not be pissed off that mindful breathing works. . .

exhibit l) coming home to a full fridge full of things my husband got for me specifically because i love these things (like beer and cheese - yeah, i'm so from wisconsin)

i'm glad that life isn't really like a video game and life force tokens can be cached rather than limited to 5 and crash over the bank of all the following days.

i'll leave you with something else that made me smile. . . a picture from 5 years ago when i was stage manager of an opera in New York.  dude, that was fucking awesome.