Striking a Balance

I want to apologize for dropping off the planet for the last week or so. Last Monday, I reluctantly returned to work (land of the whining and desperate student), and quickly found myself turning energies toward things like dealing with students and other matters. Then Gina called me Tuesday night, and we began talking about how much she loved some of my writing (it means a great deal when your children value your writing or creative activities). She pushed me to pull out a play I wrote in grad school for a playwright class. It was a one-act play and she'd pretty much watched me as I developed and pushed out a version of the play back in 2009 (at least, I'm pretty sure it was 2009...still not sure about that). I spent the evening finding the play on one of my old flash drives, putting it on my laptop and on my Google drive and Dropbox, and then going back over the play because it was a long time since I'd visited with these characters. I was shocked at how well the play read after all this time. 

In all honesty, I always am surprised by my writing. I'm not sure why. I know I am a competent (maybe even talented) writer, but I still read my work and am not sure how that person who is representing on the page (or screen) is the same person I see in the mirror every day. It's a mystery. Still, the play was strong---until the last page. 

The ending was missing!

I freaked out. I texted Amanda. I probably would not have freaked out so much if I hadn't decided to enter the play in a contest where the deadline was less than a week away (the deadline was today). I remembered the ending I'd originally written for the piece. I also remembered that the readers in the class gave it mixed reviews. The general consensus was that it didn't work. At the time, I was frustrated. It was a perfect ending to me at the time. I was attempting to avoid something that would be too sentimental. I guess the consensus is what made me leave the piece so long. Maybe that's why the ending was missing too. I vaguely remember trying to rework the end, and getting frustrated and deleting it. 

Then I had an idea. I would let a few friends read the play, get comments, and while that was going on, I'd think on how to reconstruct the ending. I sent it to Amanda and Thomas, my game master, who was a real comfort when I first started freaking out about the ending. Then another friend popped up and asked to read as well (by then I'd posted an "OMG" sort of status on my Facebook account), so I sent Terry the Preacherman a link as well. I also added Gina to the Dropbox link because I figured since she'd prompted this madness, she should get to read my work too. 

I got several kind comments and one "Do it," from Gina. Thursday rolled around and I still had no ending. On top of this, I was EXHAUSTED!

Let me explain something at this point. I am not a nocturnal person. I never have been. This has curtailed much of my ability to become a party girl or to have many late night adventures (ok, that's not completely true, but it's pretty true). If I'm awake till midnight or beyond, there's usually a good reason---like my brain can't sleep, or, like last Wednesday night, I am gaming (BTW great game and a shout out to my fellow members of the Order of the Wednesday Knights). Last week, I had two nights of not going to bed till well after midnight. Tuesday night I was awake because my brain had started going strong after I found the play on the flash drive. I couldn't sleep. By Thursday night, I'm not really sure how I was functional. In spite of this, I managed to bounce ideas around with Thomas (you will get credit for this, I promise, man. Please don't kill Mezzy. Remember you love her.), and the ending scene was born. I say born. It was more like it sizzled right out of me in an amount of time I'm not sure I can even measure. It was totally different than the original ending. 

It made me cry. 

I never, ever cry over my own work. 

I passed around the completed version of the play for comments and help. I was not about to send something that didn't work to a contest where $600 was on the line. People were kind and helpful, and I am thankful for their help. Saturday morning, I sent it on its way. Now I wait. 

This post, however, is about striking a balance, right?

I find that I have a hard time striking balance, especially when my creative energy goes all over the place. This is why I spend some weeks knitting like there is no tomorrow, and then bounce over and work like a madwoman on my novel, and then work on this blog and post several times in a week, and enter contests, and tweet. I bounce a lot because I am engaged by several things. I am always impressed by people who keep an almost daily blog. I did it myself for a few years with Cult of the Invisible Woman (seems like a lifetime ago). It's difficult to manage being consistent that way when your brain goes a lot of different directions. 

And no, I do not have ADHD. I'm just interested in lots of different things and fill my life with those things.

I've worked for years to balance out everything, and have come to the general feeling that balance is not possible. Maybe that's okay. Just do things as you come to them and as you feel them, and as long as there is no deadline, you're fine. I've found that if I approach my life that way, I'm a lot happier and less stressed. I do have certain things I do at certain times, do not get me wrong. I am on a schedule of sorts. I grade at certain times and accomplish things on time (note me getting the play into the contest before the deadline). Still, I am working on not letting my many possibilities for creative activity overwhelm me. I'm just doing it. 

Maybe that's the key to everything.