The Ragged Edge

I'm back on the ragged edge of coming down from a high. I found myself driven and finished the first draft of "Angel" and had to kick it to the curb. If I didn't separate myself from it, I would have kept adding scenes here and there without ever finishing a draft. Now, I have a first draft that is appropriately bad. I can wait a few days then look it over to decide what needs to be done with it next. Chances are that certain characters will need to be strengthened and others will have to be removed. It's too soon to think of that because I still like them all.

Any serious concentration means more intense pain. It's a fact of life and the fact that I love writing makes the pain more worth it. It doesn't take away the pain or the need for breaks. When I'm winding down a project, I do tend to lose the ability to rest. I keep thinking that just one more whatever will finish the job. Of course, my disability is too powerful to fight head on like that. If I can't make myself sleep, I can lie down for an hour listening to music. I can re-read something that inspired what I'm doing. Usually, I feel a bit refreshed after an hour and I'm ready to go again.

So, I kicked the "Angel" project to the curb without cab fare to complete the metaphor. You'd have thought I actually did it with the way I felt. I wanted to re-read it just one more time to check this or that potential problem but it's too early. I can't see the problems now. I still see what I meant to write. I slept about three days straight and thought I was free. That's when the trailing edge of that momentum caught me. I was impressed by some housework that Melissa did. (I want to use one of my expressions. She banged it out. She pounded it in. She nailed it and wrestled it into submission. I just don't want to embarrass her so I banged out the first draft and she simply "did" the housework.) She made a hole in the clutter.

Honestly, I think I'm afflicted with something called "clutter blindness" that truly does exist. Part of it is being realistic about Chiari pain but just as much is this blindness. As long as the clutter stays out of my designated areas that I want clutter free, it doesn't exist. There could be a pile of papers as tall as I am (but there isn't and there never has been) and I won't notice it unless it encroaches onto my territory. My cats drive me nuts at times because it seems to me that they generate absurd amounts of clutter. The truth is that they generate small amounts of clutter that extend into my "clean" zones. Worse, my girls cause clutter to make noise. I can ignore it if it just sits there and I do. When Maddie rammed a trash can in my office at full speed just now, it made noise and I saw it was over flowing. Therefore, I'm going to deal with it right now.

That was a classic case. I came up here to write a cautionary tale of exhaustion but the ragged edge pulled me back in. There's no point in looking at "Angel" again so I'm working on a story that started as a simple exercise in describing someone. Since the entire thing started with a description of a high school girl I decided to name Dominique, I had to make the story be about someone else. One thing pulls me to the next until I collapse from exhaustion and sleep for three days.

It's a mindless state to be in. Toward the end, I'll be desperate to sleep but virtually mainlining caffeine to keep at it. I suppose that I should go meditate or something. It used to help me come down. I'm just afraid of the pain that's waiting for me "down there." I can feel it now despite the adrenaline masking it so I know it will be bad.

I want to be awake for when Melissa comes home so I can present my take on her plan to get us a new dishwasher. It involves saving a small amount in numbers of dollars but a much larger percentage by changing how we acquire comfort food. If I'm not careful, I'll present a desperate request for comfort food from a raving maniac in pain. Must make myself presentable for when she comes home."