Well, that didn’t work out as planned

Remember when I was on vacation earlier this month (as much as anyone self-employed who works at home can be) and I was all I’M GOING TO WRITE A SHORT BLOG POST EVERY DAY and then that sort of petered out once I got back into working every day…?

Yeahhhhhhhh.

Not, like, THE MINUTE I got back to working, but within about a week, I started having less and less “time.” Wake up. TV with friends (or back yard with dogs). While on “vacation” my next step would be write a little. Then take a look at what the rest of the day called for. But since about the second week of getting back, there are at least two, maybe three days a week I haven’t been able to get into the studio at all. Those days were full of errands and other things that kept me away, sometimes away from home for a block of time, which also ate into my writing time. And all of that meant that on the days I could get into the studio, I would try to get twice or even three times the work done… meaning I didn’t have time for anything else.

“I’ll just write something after I finish all this studio work” I would tell myself… but then be so brain fried by the time 6 or 7 PM rolled around I just couldn’t focus to write something.

Why was I doing that?

I think part of it goes back to before Tim died. I’d want to be done with everything for the day by 6 or 7, because I’d need to cook dinner by 7, and after dinner, Tim would want to watch TV until I went to bed. I usually get tired around 9/9:30, head for bed around 9:30, and am asleep by about 10. So that was roughly three hours that was never ever work time (unless I was doing something like accounting or social media while we were watching TV). I don’t know why I still feel like I need to be done with stuff by 6 or 7. Sure, I’ve got to feed the pets, and myself, but…. Jeff feeds himself, and Jeff isn’t into hanging out after dinner. So why am I still blocking off that time as “BE DONE BY”?

What if I did the stuff I want to do first thing in the day, and THEN start studio time a little before or after lunchtime? Why don’t I make concentrated, fun but tiring studio work, later in the day? Am I going to put off writing if it’s 6 PM and I’m tired even if I know it’ll only take about an hour? Yeah, probably. But am I going to walk away from a clay piece that’s unfinished, knowing it will dry out before I can finish it, if it’s 6 PM and I’m tired and I know it’ll only take another hour? No. I’m going to finish that shit or the next day all of my work will have been for nothing when the piece is too dry to work with it.

I’ll still be working about the same number of hours, the obligations will just be rearranged. Doesn’t starting off slow, writing for a bit in the morning, then getting any orders out, then maybe folding some laundry or putting the clean dishes away, and THEN going into the studio and burying myself in work/fun for about six hours sound like a much more evenly loaded day than rushing over into work, getting myself confused and sidetracked because I’m not really awake and ready yet but omg I have to do ALL THE THINGS and then by dinnertime I’m tired from wrangling myself all day but I still have to eat and fold laundry and put the dishes away and oh yeah get some writing done?

Yeah, I think so to. So Imma try that next week. We’ll see how it goes…

Here; for tax, for reading all of that… have a sneak peek picture of something I worked on last week but won’t be talking about on HaldeCraft until next week (the whole thing about why I post about two weeks behind my actual work, on work social media, is a whole other blog post that maybe I’ll get into some day).