Faking It, vis-à-vis Making It

Sorry, y'all. I've been behind.

It's a funny thing about being behind, though. When you're really in the weeds, you don't have the time or energy to notice other people like they deserve to be noticed. Emails and messages and callbacks and check-ins - all your little thoughtfulnesses choke down to a trickle, and the ones from other people pile up unreturned. It's not a good feeling - but it's not one I'm unfamiliar with either.

I tell you what, though: there's a weird extra dimension to it when you're playing in the pro leagues. When you can't promote other people properly, it feels doubly greasy to go on promoting yourself. So you stop doing any promotion at all... which means that all the people who are out there promoting YOU get utterly shafted, because spotlighting their efforts means spotlighting yourself, and since you just absolutely can't bring yourself to do that, you end up doing nothing and helping nobody.

Look, I never said it wasn't dumb as hell.

Here's the thing, though. The longer I play this game (and granted, it's not been long at all), the more I notice the reputation I'm garnering - and honestly, it's a prize in itself. I love walking into a room and instantly getting hollered on (which, for those of you unfamiliar with redneck prepositions, is totally different from getting hollered at). I love it when somebody I don't even recognize holds an elevator door for me and says "get in here, Tex!" I love, love, love being the kind of person people want to glom onto. More than anything, I love sucking up all that energy and blasting it back out, like the sea receding in the moments before a devastating tidal wave of enthusiasm.

But the thing is, that only works because it's REAL - and because it involves feeding off the realness of other people. I am 100% legit psyched to be there, and it's the easiest thing in the world to reflect that back on other people. Much harder to feel that joy when there's nobody around to draw from, and it's just me alone in a room with a blinking cursor and a to-do list.

I'm still working on that.

And I know that no job is fun all the time, and that sometimes you just have to fake it 'til you make it. But man... as dumb as it feels to write this, I just 100% seriously don't want to end up like one of those plastic talk show hosts - you know, always SUPER PSYCHED about how whoever/whatever is their FAVORITE BEST EVER, even as that weird dead-eyed expression sets in and rumors swirl about a secret drug problem. Enthusiasm is a sacred thing, at least to me. It feels like a special kind of wrong to fake it.

Or better to say, I know I need to do better at this - be more present and consistent, especially online - if I'm serious about getting somewhere. And I am. But there's got to be a way to do it that doesn't involve selling out my one special mutant power. I don't want to get better at pretending to be excited. I want to find new ways to actually get excited, and do a better job of expressing that, especially here in cyber-land.

So I'm going to take this week to do some visible and long-overdue appreciation of the people whose work I am genuinely enjoying. I'm also going to play board games and eat ridiculous things with my family and read books in the bathtub and enjoy the little quiet spaces in between. Enjoy the reprieve, citizens - next week, we're getting back on the wagon!

Listing to Port

You know, I feel really bad that I haven't updated here more often.  I'm so full of thoughts - oh, happy reader, if only you could taste a delectable full-bodied slice of my gray matter today! - and yet having so dang much trouble with follow-through.

Actually, a better way to say it is this: I feel like half of my brain is burning out from overuse, and the other half is rotting.  I knew it was getting bad when I found myself suddenly, desperately excited at the prospect of teaching GMAT math.  Or hell, ANY math.  My 10th-grade tutoring student whipped out her geometry homework this week, and it was like someone had offered me - dare I say that deadly four-letter C-word? - cake.

Meanwhile, the right side of my brain is busy failing at two blogs, four social media accounts, six email addresses, a line-editing project, and writing the first draft of one whopping big manuscript that really, positively needs to be done by Christmas.

To be clear: these are all TERRIFIC problems to have, and I'm grateful for every one of them.  It's just that collectively, they do end up with me sitting at my computer, begging myself to do something - anything! - but mostly staring at the dried sneeze-speckles on the screen in vacant fascination.

Dramatic re-enactment, starring my nephew, Pete.

Actually, I think this is a small part of the reason why I am so dang excited for WorldCon this week.  Hanging out with people in real-time is such a joy, you know?  Yes, it wears you out in its own peculiar way, but what a relief to only have four seconds to draft your response, instead of letting that blinking cursor leer at you for hours, or a whole entire weekend, while you attempt to compose the reply which will stand forever as a testament to your craft and thoughtfulness, or embarrassing lack thereof.

Dear Grandma,

Thank you so much for the Precious Moments figurine.  I'll think of you every time I see this adorable club-footed cherub, and remember to make my monthly donation to the Tow-Headed Caucasian Children's Fund.  Can't wait to see you at Kitschmas!

And no, it's not like every tweet and post and 3AM drunken gmail missive has to be some Ozymandian monument for the ages - but every one of them is explicitly meant to be noticed by somebody (especially when you are now in the business of being noticed by as many people as possible!), so why wouldn't you want them to look their best?  Especially once people have seen what your best really looks like.  From then on, they'll know in a heartbeat if you show up with anything less.

My God, is this what it's like to feel incapable of leaving the house without makeup?  Shall I never again browse the aisles of the Internet in my social sweatpants?

Well, perhaps not today.

And so I continue overclocking my frontal lobe, wallowing in problems that I am absolutely delighted to have, cultivating perfectionism at the expense of promptness, and wishing like the dickens that I weren't always, constantly, CONTINUALLY keeping at least one person waiting on me for something or other.

Sorry about that, y'all.  C'est la belle vie.  But if anyone needs any help with solving simultaneous equations or calculating probability, I am prepared to render aid with positively blistering vigor.  In the meantime, bring on WorldCon!

Psst.  Your participles are showing, dear.

Schooled

You know what's great about school?

School is structure incarnate.  School is boot camp for proto-humans.  You show up, they issue you a supply list, a schedule, and a syllabus, none of which are unclear.  "You have only to follow all of these directives, exactly and to the letter," they say, "and all will be well."

And really, for all the bad rap school gets, those little Doozer-towers of artificial structure are solid as hell.  You know, no middle schooler lies awake at night trying to figure out who he has to kiss up to in order to make freshman.  There's no rumors running around the lunch table about downsizing if the tenth grade doesn't meet its fourth-quarter projections.  Shoot, kids in school don't even have the luxury of a midafternoon slump.  Yeah, you can sit there all full and sleepy from lunch, but it's not like you're staring down a tedious inbox and a mess of papers on your desk and trying to figure out where to start.  It's 1:27PM, you're in Spanish I, and your only job is to sit up and pay the hell attention while Mrs. Hill teaches you how to have an involved and respectable discussion about how many lapices and cuadernos you have in your mochila.

By the way, the answer is tres.  Or possibly azul.

Real life is so not school.

Oh, sure, there are still assignments and deadlines and multiple authority figures, each completely oblivious to the demands of the others.  (Tomorrow, I have a tutoring session scheduled for 2, a PowerPoint presentation to turn in by EOB, and a can of Fancy Feast due at 6:30 sharp.)  But as soon as you zoom out of the daily do-list, things get so much more nebulous.  Where's the assignment sheet for the Career project?  What's your current GPA in Health?  Is there some sort of extra credit you can do to bring up your grade in Girlfriend?

Pro tip: it only counts as extra credit if you do it before it starts to smell.

Lately I've been feeling pretty miserably disorganized.  I want so badly to make 2013 the year I turn writing into my Real Job (not necessarily in terms of income, which is in the lap of the gods, but in terms of "this is my full-time focus, the cornerstone of my identity as a self-respecting functional human, the thing I can tell people at cocktail parties while keeping a straight face.")  But it is also the least self-structuring vocation ever.  And there is this annoying voice in the back of my head saying, "Christ, you can't even remember to return text messages - what makes you think you have the organizational chops to grow a platform, write a curriculum, publish articles, serve on a committee, and god forbid, actually write another book?"

Not gonna lie - I could really go for an angry ruler-wielding nun.

However, the ever-fantastic Annie Neugebauer has ridden to my rescue with her Tips for Greater Productivity blog post, and its chart-topping sequel.  Here was me fantasizing about bell schedules and assignment calendars, and there she is laying it out straight.

We CAN have school again, you guys.  We just have to school our OWN SELVES.

Meet Sister Mary Lazarus, my new personal assistant.

And I can't tell you how happy I am to finally have a system in place.  No more fermenting in bed until 10 AM - I've been up before 7 every day for a week.  No more firing up the computer, wondering which of the two dozen things on my to-do list to hit first, and ultimately soaking half my time into the endless thirsty sponge of Wikipedia and Google News.  I have written out a schedule, organized my desk, and yes, bought myself a professional set of Ninja Turtle two-pocket folders, and I am going to handle up on my business.

And that is my wish for you as well.  Whatever business you have set for yourself this year, I hope you handle it tenaciously and with enthusiasm. And a minimum of mental knuckle-whacking, because let's face it - life is much better when you're no longer four feet tall and powerless.

There's lots to do; we have a very busy schedule-
At 8 o'clock we get up, and then we spend
From 8 to 9 daydreaming.
From 9 to 9:30 we take our early midmorning nap.
From 9:30 to 10:30 we dawdle and delay.
From 10:30 to 11:30 we take our late early morning nap.
From ll:00 to 12:00 we bide our time and then eat lunch.