I just have been too tired to write lately. Which is sort of a problem since what my employers pay me for is, er, writing. but it just hurts my eyes to even look at the screen and all I want to do is curl up with a warm blanket and nap. Part of it is that it’s getting so damn cold outside. And it gets dark at about 4. But it’s also that I’ve been working way too much. For months. And working nights and weekends for months, even when it’s work you enjoy, gets really draining.
In the last few years, I had gotten really good at not taking work personally. You know how at your yearly reviews, you have to come up with weaknesses to work on? When I started out in the working world, that was my big weakness. I took everything personally. I couldn’t separate business life from my life. I cared about everything, even when “everything” was making sure electrical parts in plastic and cardboard containers that cost 75 cents were all hanging correctly on their pegs. I cried all the time. Why wasn’t I better at keeping the pegs aligned? It was ridiculous.
Over the years, I separated my work product from me. If the business was heading a different direction, I headed along with them. That’s what they paid me for. I didn’t cry about why they didn’t care about my peg alignment problems.
However, I have noticed that working too many hours has made me touchy. When things head in a different direction, I think, well, fuck. What the hell did I spend ten thousand hours on that for then? Possibly you could have not asked me to do that if you were going to then totally change your mind and head off in some random direction because then I could have had some SLEEP.
Which is better than crying and taking things personally, but is still ridiculous from a business sense. Work is work. You work on things; you work on other things. That’s just the nature of it. And if you’re too tired, then maybe, as an adult, you need to choose sleep over work every so often. (And by “you”, obviously, I mean “me”. You probably are already smart enough to choose sleep.)
In any case, it’s certainly not my employer’s fault I make bad choices and can’t set priorities. After all, who the fuck cares if the pegs aren’t aligned?
I’m talking about metaphorical pegs. My job doesn’t actually involve peg-filling inventory at this point. See the pegs just represent the little things that I should let go. And not obsess over. It’s like.. .oh, never mind. Forget the pegs. There are no pegs.
Anyway, you would think that being tired wouldn’t keep me from writing. After all, mostly it consists of sitting on the couch with my laptop and moving my fingers. But my brain just doesn’t want to come up with words. Mostly, my brain wants to rest inside my head and do nothing.
And although more coffee would normally help, amazingly enough, there is actually a point at which coffee ceases to matter. Or, at least, it ceases to wake up your brain and puts you into a vibrating fog. Which should really be more fun than it is.
Things that are actually important:
- Getting my cats’ teeth cleaned. The bad breath has gotten so bad that when a cat is on your lap and is cleaning himself, you have to push the cat to the ground as quickly as possible to avoid being knocked out by the smell. It’s a problem.
- Snowboarding. Surely the cold will wake me up.
- Writing. And I don’t mean at work. Although I should also write at work as to give my company a reason to continue to pay me.
- Sleep. Who knew you needed it?
I think those are about all the goals I can handle right now. I’m too sleepy for more than that.