Posted by: 9to5poet | February 7, 2010

Resource Tracking, Week 5: Monday, February 1-Sunday, February 7

Activity Totals for the Week:

  • Television: 10.83 hours
  • Homework: 0.50 hours
  • Non-work Internet: 6.42 hours
  • Creative Time: 4.83 hours
  • Reading: 4.50 hours
  • Blogging: 1.25 hours

In summary, that’s 10.83 hours on draining activities. (Thank you, Lost and SuperBowl.) I spent an almost equal amount of time, 10.58 hours, on filling activities.  (Thank you new art journals and writer’s group.)  I also spent 6.92 hours on neutral activities, with the majority going to internet usage.

My biggest challenge with tracking my time this week has been my internet usage. I have a feeling that I spent more than 6.42 hours online, but I can’t seem to remember to write it down.

When I actually have to type that I spent at least 6.42 hours online (not including working or blogging), I think that’s a little weird. That’s almost a full night’s sleep, when you think about it. Yet, when I look back to a previous week’s tracking, I’ve spent less time online this week than normal.  Hmmm. I wonder how much of my internet use is purposeful and necessary, as opposed to aimless and time-wasting? I think this is something I’ll have to watch during the coming year.

Leave a Comment

Posted in Accountability | Tags: ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | February 7, 2010

Lately

I haven’t had the time or energy for full length blog posts. But I have been thinking about them, as I go throughout my days. Here is what I’ve been thinking.

***

I’ve been swimming in books, but I haven’t had time to organize them. I had piles stacked on top of desk, my nightstand, the counters in the kitchen. I started to organize them yesterday and I condensed a 3-foot high pile of books down to a 1-foot pile.  The 1-foot pile is the one I’m committed to reading, either through school, recent purchases, or my poetryX12 commitment (yes, I’m behind).

***

I’ve been working too much. My husband has been driving me to work and in order for him to get to his job on time, I’ve been arriving at 7:15.  Even when I leave around 5 or 5:30, this just seems like too long of a day, since I’m not truly a morning person.  I also had to work 2 weekends in a row, so I had to work a long string of  days.  I love my job, but I’ve been feeling like all that I do is work-sleep-work.  I start busing again tomorrow, so I’ll be back to my normal schedule.

***

I’m bringing my body back to a state of normal. I am now 7 weeks out of surgery, as of last Friday, and I’m allowed to walk without my brace, except if I’m outside (snowy sidewalks and streets) or in otherwise “compromised environments” (slippery floors, large crowds, or other hazards).  The funny thing about this is that in order to feel normal, I have to act normal. If I want to walk normally, I have to concentrate on what it’s like to walk without a limp or a hitch. And then I have to not concentrate on it, so that my body does it naturally. If I feel a twinge, I have to walk through the twinge, until it goes away.  Luckily, it’s working and I am enjoying the freedom of walking without a leg brace for the first time in 7 months.  By next week, I should be brace-free entirely.

***

In another effort to get my body back to normal, I had my very first reiki session ever. (A friend of mine is training to be a reiki practitioner and she is at the stage where she needs to practice on people.) I didn’t know what to expect. What was interesting is that she could tell the places in my body that were the most out of whack, based on the heat that they gave off. I could feel the heat too, radiating off of me.

***

I want to plunge myself back into my body. I’ve been avoiding being present in my body, because of all the knee problems and physical discomfort. But now that I’m slowly reaching normal, I want to remember what it’s like to give awareness to my body.  So, I’m getting a massage on my day off next week. It’s one step, among many.

***

I haven’t been writing a lot of poems. I had a good couple of writing weeks and then I screeched to a halt.  But that doesn’t mean that I’m not creating.  I’ve started a couple of art journals this week.  One is a general inspiration journal and the other three are smaller, themed journals.  I’m hoping that they spurn regular creating.

***

Everyone around me has been sick of winter. We’re at that point when the constant gray, black, and white is depressing. With every new cold snap, we get a little angrier, a little more impatient. It’s difficult when you know that March is only a month away. I keep reminding myself that March is the snowiest month in Minnesota.  I don’t want to get my hopes up for spring yet. (I’ve clearly become a Minnesotan.)

***

I’ve been obsessed with creating a daily creative practice. Since I’ve been tracking my time usage, I keep thinking that I can build on my discipline.  I know that April is just around the corner, which means a month of writing poetry every day.  I wonder if I’m up for it this year, what with my job and school and life.  I think I may want to try it.

***

I think the theme of all of these thoughts is finding equilibrium. Equilibrium in my creative practice, my reading habits, my body, my work, and even the weather. I seem to be reaching towards my center, trying to root myself in consistency.  I’ll let you know when I get there.

Leave a Comment

Posted in Filling My Well, Knowing Myself

Posted by: 9to5poet | February 2, 2010

Resource Tracking:…a little late

I’ve been a little quiet over here, mostly because of my computer drama.  With my laptop out of commission, I found myself getting out of the habit of surfing the internets incessantly, which is good. But I didn’t circle back here once my computer was fixed to post a non-resource tracking explanatory note.  Here it is, several days late.

I didn’t track last week, because my computer wasn’t fixed until Thursday.* But, I felt like I had a productive week.  I wrote two new poems and revised a third.  I never know whether to post revisions, because my revision process is so messy. Sometimes, a poem gets a lot worse before it gets better. I suspect that this is the case with my latest revision.  In any case, I am proud that I worked on it at all, since I tend to drag my heels with revision.

I guess the takeaway for last week is that I can write and revise if I put my mind and energy towards it. And having a broken computer isn’t such a bad thing, from a productivity stand point.

*I started tracking again yesterday, since my tracking week runs Monday through Sunday. I will have a real tracking post, come hell or high water, on Sunday.

Leave a Comment

Posted in Accountability | Tags: ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 28, 2010

The Mermaid Learns to Walk

The Mermaid Learns to Walk

The sand around her refracts and shines
like glass. She focuses on each glittering

grain, each new salty breath she takes,
so that she doesn’t really feel her green

fin split into two milky white props.
She marvels at the way her scales, scallop-edged,

flake off to reveal such a smooth
surface. She is naked and awake. Her hair

tangles around her body like seaweed,
binding her to the sandbar. He takes

her hand without asking and she smiles
a tongueless, toothy smile. It is true

that every step pierces the bottoms
of her brand new feet, each grain

grinds into her skin. Yet, she remains
both silent and lovely. She simply smiles

and breathes, wonders at her new world,
leaving a trail of dark red footprints in her wake.

*****

If you’ve read my blog at all regularly, you know that I’ve written a lot about my knee injury for the past 6-ish months.  In my writer’s group, I’ve decided to write explicitly about this experience, because I feel like the injury-healing-rehabilitation process is a really visceral experience. 

My only problem with this topic is that it feels like I’m totally in my head and my (subjective) experience and it’s starting to get claustrophobic.  I need to broaden my lens.  As I was falling asleep two nights ago, I tried to remember any myths or fairy tales that involved walking or legs, and I seemed to recall that Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid included those themes. On yesterday’s day off, I looked up the story.

Boy-howdy was I right. There is so much in this story, about male-female relationships, adornment, sacrifice and of course, having legs, that I may just turn it into a cycle of poems.  We shall see.

4 Comments

Posted in Body Awareness, Drafts, Poetry | Tags: , ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 27, 2010

January’s Simple Things

Christina at Soul Aperture is hosting Simple Things once again, but with a humanitarian twist. For every blogger who participates in the prompt, she will donate $1 to Doctors Without Borders for Haiti Earthquake Relief, up to $250.  Not only do I love this prompt, but I love this idea of donating. If you haven’t participated in Simple Things before,  you should do it today. Start here to play along.

January Simple Things, Verb Edition:

  • Walking without crutches, even if it’s more of a step-slide at the end of a long day
  • Receiving an ankle rub at the end of that long day, by my loving husband
  • Waking up the next morning with a slightly stronger, slightly less sore leg
  • Finishing Stookie Stackhouse #8 in the bath this morning
  • Feeling slightly bittersweet about finishing, since I don’t have #9 in possession
  • Having a full day to myself to catch up on writing
  • Wearing sweatpants and a hoodie throughout the whole day
  • Seeing a glimpse of the larger theme of my poems, after years of thinking I was aimless
  • Listening to two new albums by Minneapolis musicians: Dessa’s A Badly Broken Code and Bethany Larson’s Sticks and Stones
  • Loving that these two women have totally different musical styles, but equally wonderful poetic lyrics

Those are my Simple Things for today.  What are yours?

5 Comments

Posted in Paying Attention | Tags:

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 26, 2010

Stitches

Stitches

Incision, I inspect you
daily, watch as angry
slivers of skin meet

in the middle, knit
together. I imagine
what happens below

the surface. Infections
rise and subside, cowed
by white blood cells. Scabs

transform my skin
into a new numb
topography. The doctor

tells me to keep you
dry, protect you against
invisible elements. (She

is a protective mother,
codling you in infancy.)
As surrogate, I can only

do my best, not
to touch you, scratch
you.  It’s a matter of time

before you fade,
like your forebears. You
will be a silver streak,

a silhouette. I will not
remember you as you are:
my constant, terrible gash.

*****

I wrote this last night, in preparation for my upcoming writer’s group meeting.  I’ve been worried that I have too many half-finished drafts and not enough poems.  I forced myself to sit down and write and complete  a draft of a poem, rather than tweeting the lines as they come to me and composing them on paper later.

As much as I like the tweeting process, it’s almost too instantaneous for me. I feel like it’s finished and out in the world, maybe when it’s too early for either. When I was in college, I took a poetry workshop with Denise Levertov right before she died.  She encouraged us to never type up our poems until they were absolutely, positively finished. She felt that if we saw them somewhat professionally presented on the page, we wouldn’t revise. In many ways, I agree with her.

Since she died later that year, she obviously missed the explosion of online expression and self-publishing. I wonder what she would think.

3 Comments

Posted in Body Awareness, Drafts, Poetry | Tags:

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 24, 2010

Resource Tracking: None

I’ve had quite the week.  It was going fine until Wednesday evening when my cat hopped on top of my laptop and pushed it on to the ground. While it only fell three feet at the most, it got damaged.  I think the problem is that my AC adapter got bent through the fall. So, I’ve ordered a new adapter which should arrive early next week. 

Since I haven’t been able to get juice to my laptop, I haven’t been turning it on. And since I haven’t turned it on, I haven’t tracked my hours usage. I’m a little frustrated because I know that habits take (on average) three weeks to integrate into routine.  Now, I’ll have to start all over with my tracking, at least from that perspective.

On the plus side, I think that I’ve had a pretty productive week. I’ve noticed that I have started a lot of projects and poems, but I haven’t finished many. I’m going to spend my day off this week (Wednesday) working on completion.  I feel like I’ve spent much less time watching TV and I know I haven’t been on the web often. Perhaps this week was a win, even if I can’t quantify it.

Tracking will return, just as soon as I can get power to my laptop.  If that’s truly the problem… please keep your fingers crossed for me.

1 Comment

Posted in Accountability | Tags: ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 18, 2010

Resource Tracking, Week 3: Monday, January 11-Sunday, January 17

Activity Totals for the Week:

  • Television: 9.67 hours
  • Homework: 5.51 hours
  • Non-work Internet: 8.33 hours
  • Creative Time: 4.40 hours
  • Reading: 9.17 hours
  • Blogging: 1.14 hours

Dear Golden Globes,

You almost ruined my activity totals for the week. I was going to slide in with close to 3 fewer hours of television watching and about 2 fewer hours of non-work internet than last week. But then, I wanted to watch you.  You, with your lengthy, tear-drenched speeches, drunken line-flubs, and really mean Ricky Gervais jokes. (I loved those, BTW.)

Instead of the million other things I could have been doing, I watched you and read Twitter for live updates from the stars I stalk, er follow. Really, I should have been reading the 4 chapters of positive psychology text that’s due next Saturday.  Honestly, even reading Sookie Stackhouse would have been more productive than your show.  I’m just glad that I cut you off at 9:20 to go to bed, even if I only saved an hour (tops) off of my TV watching time.

Now, I’m left with 9.67 hours of draining time for the week, which is still less than last week.  On neutral activities, I increased a bit from last week  to 8.33 hours, which I choose to blame on the 3.42 hours I spent writing a 5 paragraph essay on Saturday.  Luckily, I spent 14.98 hours on filling activities. I’d like to thank my writer’s group and the ridiculously addictive Stookie Stackhouse novels for this week’s 4.5 hour increase in filling activities.

I guess what I’m learning is that I can splurge on watching you, ridiculous awards show, if I’ve already filled my bank with good activities throughout the week. If I really want to see my favorite movies lose to that other nominee, I can do it.  I just can’t make a habit out of it. It’s just like eating – I can have a piece of red velvet birthday cake (thanks, hubby), if I’ve eaten healthy foods all week.

That’s good to know, because the Oscars are coming soon.

Thank you for wasting (only a little) of my time on Sunday.

Love,

Jessica

2 Comments

Posted in Accountability | Tags: , ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 15, 2010

What Type of Artist Am I?

There’s something that has always been a struggle for me – reconciling the kind of artist I want to be with the kind of artist I am.

In my dream-life, I am the type of artist that can launch an independent career. Not a career that’s beholden to the publishing industry or the cycle of acceptance and rejection, but the type of career where I create my own opportunities for publishing.  In my dream-life, I can manage creating, promoting, publishing, and selling my work in some form or another.

In reality, I struggle to make a regular space for my creative life. I squeeze creative activities into the smallest crevices. If I had to answer to customers and marketing plans and all the other myriad tasks that come with being a successful creative entrepreneur, I would implode. I work very hard in my day job and work very little in my creative job.  In reality, my creative life is a release for me, a way that I can express myself and lower stress.  I often wonder if I turned my creative life into a career and pursued it with the kind of zeal necessary to be successful, if it would still fill that relaxing space for me.

I’m lucky in that I love my day job and my career. I am happy and fulfilled through my work in higher education. I don’t want an artistic career that supplants my education career. In my optimistic-winter-break-brain, I want an artistic career in addition to my education career.

Honestly, that’s part of the reason that I chose “resources” as my word of the year. I want to see if there is space in my life for regular creative practice. I want to create a “clock-in-clock-0ut” mentality for my artistic work. Then, I can build on that regular practice and find the next step.

As I begin this tracking practice, I can see that it’s difficult to add this time to my life. It’s difficult because I have grown different habits over the past months, patterns of behavior that I find comforting.  But I also see a tiny sliver of the possibility that I could add more.  It’s this little slice of optimism that makes me pause. There’s part of me that wants to try for a larger creative life and then another part of me that wants to be satisfied with what I already have.

Tonight, I just want to mark that I am waffling between these extremes (again).  I’m chaffing at adding more to my creative life, just as I begin the process of regulating my practice. I can’t (and won’t) make any decisions that will commit me to more work than I can handle.  I’ll just note my optimism and ambition and bottle it for later.

Comments Off

Posted in Finding Purpose, Knowing Myself, Work-Life Balance | Tags: ,

Posted by: 9to5poet | January 12, 2010

12 Books of Poetry in 12 Months

Dana from Read Write Poem and My Gorgeous Somewhere posted a lovely idea for a twelve month poetry reading challenge.  Each month, if you choose to participate, you read the following themes of books:
  • January — Read a poetry collection published the year you were born
  • February — Read a poetry collection recommended on a blog
  • March — Read a poetry collection written by a poet who has been featured in a movie
  • April — Read your favorite poetry collection from childhood
  • May — Read a poetry collection from another country
  • June — Read that classic poetry collection you never read
  • July — Read a poetry collection you find on Good Reads
  • August — Read a chapbook
  • September — Read a poetry collection you would not typically read
  • October — Read a selection from a local book club
  • November — Read an award-winner
  • December — Read someone else’s favorite poetry collection

I feel like I haven’t had enough poetry in my life lately, so I’m going to try my darndest to play along.  I’m hoping to find some new poets that I haven’t explored, as well as kick-start my own writing practice.

Today at work, I perused the library for my January book, which should be published in the year I was born.  1977 was a pretty good year for poetry. After looking at books by Heather McHugh, June Jordan, W.D. Snodgrass, and others, I picked the following three books:

I doubt I’ll get to all three, but I’m determined to finish one by the end of the month. I’ll probably start with Olga..  Once I’m finished with my book, I’ll post a brief review here to tell you about my experience with the book.

If you want to play along, check out Dana’s site for more information.

Comments Off

Posted in Books, Creative Community, Poetry | Tags:

Older Posts »

Categories