Last night we pulled out the VCR, popped in a few VHS tapes and dabbled in the pool of old home movies.  We saw my sister get her first piece of candy, my grandmother sing in front of an unappreciative audience (her 4 year old grandchildren), tons of presents opened, a Christmas tree trimmed, and interviews with a pair of twins twenty years ago when we turned ten. In between the talent show, homemade stop motion troll movie, and the summer school graduation where the kids wore white trash bags as gowns, something dawned on me.

As a kid, I used to be fearless.  In fact until I hit high school and puberty I really didn’t have any self-esteem issues, body image problems, or doubts.  Doubts are made for when life crashes into you and pins you to the floor, when you second guess everything about yourself, when the sum of what you see doesn’t add up to what you feel.  But as a kid I did things I can’t even imagine doing now – standing up for a girl with no friends and facing ridicule from everyone else, defying the mean girl with the violent streak because I wasn’t going to let her push me around, performing in front of a crowd because I wanted to.  I remember clearly the moment the illusion shattered – when I realized damn, I sucked at that, why did my parents let me up there – but that girl before she realized it was an illusion, she rocked.

It was embarrassing to say the least – watching yourself 15, 20 years ago always is – but it was also enlightening.  People say they want to be kids again and I always thought it was because of the lack of bills and responsibility and stress.  But that’s not the whole story.  Because the childhood you was daring and adventurous, wild and creative before any of those words became euphemisms for business strategies and core competencies.  The ten year old me saw most of the world as black and white, but the results of that were breathtaking.

I don’t see much of that girl in me anymore and that’s a shame.  As I sit here and think about what I want the next decade of my life to be, I know that if I let that girl come out and play more, be as exuberant and fearlessly herself as a 12 year old who didn’t know any better was, then I would be a happier person.  My life would be better for it.  Can I tap dance and play the flute and sing any better now than I did then?  Highly unlikely.  But she didn’t know the word ‘can’t’  – and neither should I.

This morning I woke up, opened my eyes, and a thought occurred to me – I SUCK at multi-tasking.

You wouldn’t think this would be such an epiphany but it was.  Because I spend my days trying to do many things at once and when I don’t fail miserably I think “Hey, yeah, I got this multi-tasking thing down.  Productivity Superstar!”   But that’s not the case at all.

So there I was this morning, thinking about last night – how I should have started my thesis but didn’t – and looking at my alarm clock – and how I said I was going to get up to go to the gym and didn’t – and deciding whether I should snooze my alarm even though I was awake – I did – that it really sunk in.  I’ve always known I was a commit everything, all or nothing kind of person, I just didn’t realize it extended to the mundane task of tasks.

On Saturday I finished writing my novel (yeah, go me!) and I was hoping this would pave the way for me to focus on my final project for grad school (which I now only have about 6 weeks to complete – eek!)  On some level I knew that I couldn’t hold room in my head for both of them.  But then I got another idea for a book and the project gets pushed farther and farther away every time I think of them.  Curses!

But this happens around my house too – yes I need to clean but I don’t have enough time to do the whole thing so why even start.  Yes I should pay those bills but I haven’t organized the office yet so I don’t know where my mail is supposed to go so why bother.  What, my car needs to be washed – don’t even get me STARTED on how much my care needs to be washed – but the car wash I have the gift certificate for is in another city and I should really be taking the time to clean my house . . .    See, the excuses and being pulled 20 different ways is endless.

How did I THINK I was good at multi-tasking for so long?  Simple – I’m organized.  Not like OCD, I can tell you how many paper clips are in the cup organized but your basic bland organized.  Except with pretty colored pens and bright file folders – I like to color code.  And I make lists – lots of lists – that help remind me what I have to do.  When I don’t have the lists I rely on my memory which is not a good way to remember EVERYTHING so I list.  I list and I feel better.  And then I stare at the list and get overwhelmed.  There seems to be a pattern here.

But now that I’ve recognized it, let’s see if I can beat it.  Today at work I will make a list of everything I want to get done and when I’m working on something, I’m working on it.  No changes mid-shift, no stopping to get three other things done, just concentrate on the task at hand and then move on.  Hopefully it works because, seriously, my car really is dirty, my house needs to be cleaned and that Thesis of 120 hours of work?  It ain’t gonna research itself. 

Creativity is awesome, stellar, tubular, rad (really dating myself with this list, huh?), magnificent, great, and wonderful.  It’s also a huge pain in the ass.

Don’t get me wrong – sometimes I think about what life would be like if I didn’t have it sitting in my Mary Poppins bag of tricks (other items in that bag: chapstick) and it’s not a pretty thought.  My life has stories to tell and they’d be infinitely more boring if I didn’t have it.  I’d be that droning uncle at family reunions and none of us want that, really.

But right now, part of me really wants to strangle creativity’s neck.  Not because it isn’t nice and pretty and helpful – nope, it’s all those things.  But because it just won’t leave me alone!  I’ve fallen into a creativity bubble – forgetting to eat dinner, only getting four hours of sleep, wanting to spend every moment reading and rereading and vacillating between “I just have” or “I have just.”  Truthfully it isn’t such a bad place to be . . .

. . . except for the fact that I really have some other things I have to do.  I have a job – getting four hours of sleep doesn’t really help me stay awake at it.  I’m supposed to be researching and writing my thesis paper – sadly the romantic entanglements of fictional royalty does not have much bearing on my graduating.  I have a house that’s still packed in boxes – being creative won’t help me find the missing Tupperware or my cheese graters.

But I’m also way too selfish to walk away from it now.  I spent almost two years training myself to be creative when I sit in a restaurant with my notebook in hand – don’t I owe this to her, Lady Creativity, to let her come over when she wants to?  When I stopped having time for restaurants she stopped coming round and that about broke my heart.  Now she wants to catch up on lost time and what kind of friend would I be to say no?  A rude one, that’s for sure – and who wants to be rude nowadays (politicians and political pundits are taking care of that for the rest of us)?

So I’m both happy and sad that creativity came a knockin’.  I’m tired and cranky, rejuvenated and in need of buckets of caffeine, overwhelmed and startlingly at peace about it.  Heck, but what else is new – I’m a writer.

I find myself operating in that weird, teenage place of hope and denial recently.

So last month was a month of chances for me as a writer.  I did one of the most nerve-wracking things I could believe – I gave my book, randomly, to someone I knew to read.  Doesn’t sound too revolutionary, I know, but the only people who had read my stuff so far were hand-picked to love it – and me!  Not that I bemoan their truthfulness or opinions but, well, they weren’t about to crush any of my dreams, no matter how much they needed to be stepped on.

Lo and behold, the impossible happened – she loved it.  She loved everything about it!  And my heart grew two sizes (not that I’m a Grinch, I just have a really big heart now, you know, cause who likes economy sized).  So then I did something even more impressive – I participated in a charity auction for a 20 page critique from an agent I liked.  And, after spending WAY too much money – for a very worthy cause though, Water for Crits, look it up – I sent my first three chapters spiriting through the ether.

How, you may be asking, is this anything like high school.  Stop being impatient, I’m getting to that . . .

So I sent the words away and was told that I would hear something within the next 45 days.  It’s been about 30 and I’m starting to think about it too often, every time my phone shows the email icon in the corner, wondering if it’s from her and if it’s anything that I want to hear.

When I was a teenager I knew I wanted to be a writer.  I didn’t have the courage to admit it and I didn’t have the dedication to pursue it, but I still knew it.  Have probably always known it.  And I remember being a senior in high school and one of our projects for English was to write a college admissions essay.  I spent an endless number of nights figuring out what I wanted to say and when I turned in that essay I was as confident as I could be in it.  Throughout the week our teacher would read bits and pieces of essays that were good but it was never mine.  I started to doubt myself, to think that I had been wrong, maybe I hadn’t succeeded.  Until Friday when we came into the class and the teacher sat down and read my essay in entirety.

And that’s what I’m hoping for now – that the best is last.  And then the denial hits – when I realize that I didn’t send in my chapters to be critiqued, I sent them in to be validated.  I LOVE my novel, I love 100% absolutely everything about it.  I can take advice and suggestions and criticism – what I can’t take is if I find out that everything I did is just unintentionally wrong.

I’ve been told that after the first two chapters of my book, you’re hooked.  And I sent in three.  I’m holding onto some possibly childish, probably foolish, hope that the sky will open up and the heavens will sing and it will all work out beautifully.

But life has a tendency to get messy . . . .

It dawned on me this morning as I was getting ready to go to school, way too early for people to be awake on Saturdays with gorgeous weather unless you’re on your way to the beach, still tired since I slept on a couch (though one of the most comfortable couches ever) and deficent in soda so my caffeine levels were at an all time low, that I am happy.

Not exactly what you were thinking I was going to say after that paragraph of complaining, was it? Well, it was kind of a surprise for me too. Lent started this week, good ‘ole Lent. Usually I give up something, something important, something hard. Why try and give up liverwurst if you don’t ever eat it? That’s not really the point of learning about sacrifice, is it?

Previous years have seen me giving up cheese (by far the hardest thing I’ve ever done since I believe everything tastes better with cheese – and I tried to do it twice), fast food (when I was in high school and went away on a school trip for a week), soda (when I was in college and cheap fountain drinks followed me everywhere), and sweets (come on, does this one even need an explanation?). This year I decided to give up fast food (which I’m broadly defining as restaurants with a drive-thru or where you have to get your own fountain drinks), gluten (because I should be staying away from that anyway), and Soda (this one might just kill me – I was up to four Diet Coke cans a day, don’t ask how many fountain drinks I’d consume at resturants).

Sometimes it’s hard for me to commit to change but the greater purpose of Lent usually helps me stick to it (except for the second year of cheese, that was just a bitchy, ill-conceived mistake). The real purpose of Lent though is not to focus on what you’re giving up – it’s not all about the soda. It’s supposed to be teaching sacrifice. This year is seems to be teaching me something else – satisfaction.

I spend a lot of time focusing on what’s missing – because it’s easy, because it’s obvious, because it’s more concise for a tweet or facebook status. But that’s the wrong way of looking at things (so said the girl from True Grit last night – the disturbingly grittiness of that movie being a totally different discussion). And, cowboy wisdom, she’s right. I may not have soda, but what I have is a whole lot better.

I have people who love me and care about me. My sister-in-law saying she’ll cook and freeze me food to make sure that I’m eating right. My best friend giving me leftovers she thinks I might like and going out of her way when she cooked to make sure it’s all gluten free. My friend throwing a party who let’s me know she tried to find gluten free crackers but since she couldn’t she has a Spoon Strategy in place so that I won’t get sick. My mother who cooks for me every weekend, sometimes making the same things over and over again because it’s all I can eat. Love.

I have a job that I’m good at, that I like, that gives me opportunities to do many different things and challenge my skills. I have stability, a roof over my head and the means to pay for it, a car to get me to work, a network of people that I can call on to be my cheerleader, my coach, my bodyguard, and my tough-love trainer that tells me what I need to hear even when I don’t want to hear it. I have family and friends and passion and a thirst for learning and an irreverent sense of humor and a desire for a sarcasm font and characters in my head that say interesting things and the ability to quote episodes of How I Met Your Mother verbatim and this very long run on sentence. I have a lot.

Big changes are coming down the pipe for me. And sometimes I hate change – I react like one of those stupid blond sorority girls in horror movies, blindly going in one direction and then screaming in fear. And then running away. But I’m plucky – I always find my way from vapid sorority girl to plucky heroine. I go back, I don’t go by myself down the dark creepy stairway into the basement, and I take that weapon left lying on the ground and beat the living crap out of the villan. Okay, maybe that metaphor went a little off the rails but you get the drift.

And for the first time in a long time, I’m excited about the future. Well, not the Zombie Apocalypse my friend is predicting (though if I started to go to the gym again, I might be able to outrun their dinner for awhile) but for everything else. For finishing grad school and getting my weekends back (doing an eMBA program has taken every weekend of the last ten months and I’m ready to reclaim them). For moving forward on publishing my book and writing new ones. For searching out opportunities wherever they may be and taking advantage of them. For starting my grown-up, mature, full of infinite possibilities life.

So bring on the highs, the lows, the roller-coaster, the ups, the downs, and even the zombies. This girl’s ready for it.

The end of the year is approaching – only 10 days till Christmas (can I get a ‘oh shit’?) and then it’s just a downhill slide that bottoms out into 2011.  It seems that without trying we’ve once again reached a fresh start.

And of course, being me, all I can think about is where I am in relationship to where I’ve been.  And, being me, all I see is how I’ve come up short.  But yesterday I decided that maybe I’ve been thinking about this whole thing all wrong.

Last year around this time you could find me really only one place, in my bed typing furiously away.  I told myself that I was going to finish my NaNoWriMo fantasy novel from the year before (“Let’s Get Intuit”) before the year was over.  I fudged along the way – chapters that were literally only paragraphs long, gaps that I cheated to fill because the good idea was not forthcoming.  All of these things I knew but I hadn’t written anything in what seemed like forever and I was going to finish this book come hell or high water.

And then in January I sent the story out for people to read and comment on and decided that I would distract myself with another idea before the daunting prospect of editing came along.  And that’s when I happened upon RomCon, my fully formed, ridiculously fun, almost no editing required novel.  It took me six months to write – and not that I wrote every day, long periods of block and bargaining took place – but it’s done.  And, if I do say so myself, it’s kind of awesome.

So, instead of looking back and seeing where I’m not, let’s see where I’ve actually been with

Val’s List Of 2010 Moments Of Awesomeness

• I finished my novel RomCon and everyone who’s read it has liked it so far – even with all of the Chuck Norris jokes, comic book craziness, and scandalous tabloids.
• I pulled off a major work coup – I got us up and running on a software system in 5 weeks (which included training, demanding all the other departments help us, and being optimistic to the extreme) by being so persistent that they had to listen to me.  In the process I found my Work Voice – now when I talk I can generally get people to listen.
• I diagnosed myself with an annoying disease and finally figured out why I haven’t been feeling well – and have generally dealt with it without crying, complaining, or even cookies (though the pizza and pancake withdrawals still make me a little sad, it’s true).
• I bonded with my nephew – the cutest little boy in all the world, it’s true – and taught him to say my name.  Yes, he might say it with a stutter but he knows who Auntie Va-Va-Va-Val is, you better believe it.
• I managed to *almost* keep my New Year’s resolution from last year with regards to making more time to hang out with friends who live in different cities.  Which means I’ve spent much more time engaging with people I love but tend to pass like cat burglars in the night.  I am no longer just a straight line.
• Little by little I’m allowing myself to try new things.  I’ve been to a hockey game and a baseball game so far this year.  Before it’s over I’ll be going to a basketball game and forced to sing karaoke.  It may seem like small steps but hey, they’re steps.

So no, 2011 will not find me suddenly svelte and no longer single – but that’s okay.  Because as far as years go, this last one could have been worse.  Hopefully the same thing will be said for 2011, 370 days from now when I sit thinking about it (oh god, do you know how close I’ll be to 30 then?!).   Here’s looking at you year!