Writing block party.

First of all, I want to thank every single one of you who wrote in with congratulations. Really, it was the loveliest surprise, and your good wishes have been much of the motivation I’ve had towards setting up a writing schedule. During the past week whenever I would think “Yeah, I’ll start writing when Daughter goes back to school in September, or possibly some time after that…”, I’d see all of you cheering me on, encouraging me to get started. Actually, in my mind, you were all wearing cheerleading outfits and, frankly, some were better served by this outfit than others, but your flippy skirts and waving pom-poms did their duty. I created a writing schedule; I have ninety-thousand words to write. Ergo, I will write a thousand words a day for ninety days.

I didn’t say it was a complicated schedule.

And when a person signs on for writing a thousand words a day, I think we all know what happens. That’s right; the closets get incredibly organized. I’d like to thank you all and the nice people at Hyperion for giving me the incentive to view closet-organization as the lesser of two evils. When a person such as me is not writing or, as I like to call it, “Working on ideas in my head”, a person will happily determine which of the countless pairs of khaki socks Consort has is no longer suitable for public viewing. After writing 250 words, I would gleefully take a break by filleting out which of my workout t-shirts had degenerated from “Acceptable for sweating” into “Pitiful and having created its own mutant mold strain”.

Yesterday, having stapled myself to the computer chair and telling all the family members to shun me if I walked out of the office, I vowed to finish my daily 1000 words. This lasted until word 750, by which point I was making small mannequins out of paper clips. Having noted the only words left in my head were obscenities and someone muttering darkly “You can’t make me…”, I deemed it break-time. I dashed from the room and threw myself into Daughter’s room. She was lying on the bed, reading. Under her body was the folded pile of clean clothing I had asked her to put away two days before. I took in a deep breath, preparing for a wind-storm of nagging, when I noticed one of the t-shirts was, while clean, stained. The breath which had been allocated for nagging was exhaled while I grinned. I had a project.

We would clean out Daughter’s clothing.

First, all obviously stained clothing would go. This worked until I remembered she is my child, and we’re still surprised about gravity; we eat food, we drop food, we eat some more. If I used the “Obvious stain” rule as a cut-off, Daughter would have a bathing suit and her Sunday dress. Wait, let me check that. Correction; Daughter would have shoes. I amended the rule to “…obvious stains which bother me.”

The next category to go was “Life is too short”. Over the years, we have benefited from several friends who have older children and limited closet space. Daughter has received hand-me-downs which were all but unworn, leaving me with extra discretionary income to spend on things like children’s pastry-making classes, the Captain Underpants oeuvre, and Shout stain-remover. Some of this clothing has been hugely successful, some has not. Oddly enough the European hand-me-downs -- all insanely cute, exquisitely-made and pristine – never went on Daughter without a fight. Now, staring into the crammed abyss which is her closet, I made the decision to stop trying to make Daughter the cover girl for Vogue Bambini. Out went the slim-legged jeans (“I can’t play basketball in them”), the colorful jumpers (“They itch.”), the frocks with the enigmatic non-English sayings on them (“No.”). I held up one especially adorable dress, sighed and said to Daughter, “Not even once…?”

Daughter, having been given the task of matching her socks, looked up and shook her head definitively.

“Heathen”, I said without rancor and plunged back in. Having removed that which was obvious, and having no interest in finishing my writing, I chose to attack the last and more challenging category. We’ll call it “Yes…no…I don’t…help!”.

I am pleased beyond measure to note Daughter doesn’t resemble me at all. It’s really fabulous how little of me is in there. One of the ways she is not-me is how leggy she is. Since my legs begin at my knees, sometimes I just stand there and marvel at my daughter. What this means, however, is I have a much harder time determining when she has grown out of something. The skort will continue to snap around her waist easily, but just keep moving steadily up her legs. One day, without either one of us noticing, the skort becomes too short, but usually stays in the closet for another month after that, because I don’t notice it’s too short until she’s getting out of the car at school. By the time she comes home and puts it in the hamper, I forget it’s too short until the next time she wears it. This last exercise was to determine which items were still cute and appropriate, and which ones were suitable for her audition for the remake of “Taxi Driver”.

Since the only way to see was to have Daughter try all skorts on, I relieved her of sock-matching duty and impressed her into the skort army. She’d try one on; I’d make her turn around, and then turn the other way. I’d have her try shirts of different lengths on top. I’d have her do simple stretching exercises, and then sprint around the room. What seemed to Daughter to be Mommy showing an out-of-character willingness to play dress-up was rapidly becoming P.E. with multiple wardrobe changes. She darted out her door.

“Where are you going?” I called as I pulled out a box labeled “Winter clothes and knives”.

“Bathroom”, she answered.

Minutes later, she was back. With her was Consort, who was gaping at the piles of Daughter’s clothing mounded throughout her room. He said to me, “I thought you were writing.”
“I am!” I chirped, upending a box of wool sweaters on her bed. “I’m just taking a break.”
Daughter and Consort exchanged a look. I can only assume my delicate state had been discussed in the other room. Consort took the box, still filled with mittens, scarves and a set of serrated knives, and put it on the ground. He then put a hand on each of my shoulders and steered me towards the office.

“Write now,” he said firmly, just before he shut the door, leaving me alone with the computer, “Right now”.

The door clicked shut and I pouted. I didn’t like this at all. Having written is fun. Writing is like removing an African Guinea worm.

(Note to readers: This following fact is fascinating to me, and I think describes the artistic process perfectly, but I have been told it is disgusting. Be warned.)

The Guinea worm is a threadlike parasitic worm that grows and matures in people. Worms grow up to 3 feet long and are as wide as a paper clip wire. The only treatment is to remove the worm over many weeks by winding it around a small stick and pulling it out a tiny bit at a time. Sometimes the worm can be pulled out completely within a few days, but the process usually takes weeks or months.

Writing is like that. And now I had nothing to do but take out the old stick and start winding. I looked around the office. Same business-school books, same piles of unknown computer wires, same innumerable heaps of notes, messages and doodles; I looked again and had a flash of joy. Not a single object in there had been organized!

I wanted to write, I really did, but who could expect me to work within such a chaotic environment? There was only one thing I could do. Breathing a sigh of relief, I dumped a basket of random phone messages on the floor.