99 New: The Flat Arc of Laziness

Having any kind of writing life is to fret and expect sympathy. As if non-writers can relate to or care about one’s manufactured angst.

“My writing life is a mess,” I complained this morning. My husband was reading the sports page.

“Too many reruns. Five this week.,” he said, looking over his glasses at me and then back at the paper.

I argued with him. There weren’t five ‘reruns’ which is what he calls reposts on my blog. “Three,” he said, “I read everything you publish.” And then he named the three reruns and counted them off on his fingers, looked at me like I was a counter girl at McDonald’s who’d been on break too long and resumed reading about his beloved Green Bay Packers.

It stung. My husband is never unkind but neither is he indulgent in any way. He sees through my faux angst to what is really there. Laziness.

I decided at the beginning of the year to break myself of my then near-maniacal fascination with my blog stats, focus on writing longer pieces for publication, and subject myself to the review and critique of other writers. And I’ve done all that. It’s been good for me but it’s made me lazy like if I write something decent every two weeks, that’s good enough. But it isn’t. It’s making me dull-witted.

Writing every day – which is something I’ve done for years in long stretches – makes me way more aware and tuned in and sensitive to life. Brighter and smarter. So I’m going back to that, at least for the next 99 days, from now, September 17, 2018, to Christmas Day, December 25, 2018.

I am getting myself back on the beam.

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Photo by Maria Svecova on Unsplash