Okay, here goes: my first ever blog. Or is it blog “entry”? Like journal entry? Is the entire thing the blog or is each entry a blog? Such is the mind of a perfectionist (this is not someone who is perfect – far from it – more someone who expects perfection but of course doesn’t achieve it cuz it doesn’t exist, especially for the perfectionist). Usually this would stop me cold and I’d spend 15 minutes Googling the correct usage of blog. But I’m not going to do that today because I’ve set myself a goal of writing without correcting for 30 minutes. I should probably start small, with 15 minutes, since they always say start small so you have a success under your belt, gain a little confidence, and want to do it again because success feels good.
I was just going to pause and read what I wrote, which is another thing a perfectionist wannabe writer like me would do. No wonder I never finish anything! Yes, I used an exclamation point – it’s warranted. I was going to rewrite and say I believe it’s warranted, but dammit, I’m going to speak with authority and confidence and not start out with “I believe, or I think.” That is weak.
Where am I going with this? Oh yeah, my first blog. I’m doing this to challenge my perfectionism, my fear of people reading what I write for fear of what they’ll think of the writing and of me. I’m going to write without censoring myself (well, ok, a little; I’m not going to write about masturbating, at least my own. I might write about masturbation in a blog on sexuality, but not write…well you get the gist), without second guessing every third sentence, re-reading and editing so that I’m basically writing the same damn thing over and over. And it was probably just fine, or “good enough” as my good friend MA has been coaching me on for years, the first time I wrote it.
Such is the life of a failed…no, not failed. A perfectionist wannabe writer. How can you call something failed if you haven’t really tried it? I haven’t been published but I’ve only sent in 3 things. I never heard back, so is that failed? To fail in writing for me would be to stop trying. I keep this quote by Richard Bach by my computer: “A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.”
God it’s getting hard not to read what I wrote. Keep going Kim. Like a train ploughing through snow on tracks in the mountains, or an icebreaker in the Arctic. Just keep going forward. Okay. Gosh when I’m walking or running or driving I have this great stream of consciousness, or even organized thinking. Then I hit the driveway and it’s gone. Now I can’t remember that great line I had. It’s like a thread or yarn you follow back to find the knot or dropped stitch and you reach the end but it’s just the end of the thread in open space.
My good friend LK and I mulled over our perfectionist tendencies – oh shut up! They’re not tendencies, but full-blown conditions. I once went to see a therapist and after 10 minutes of my dribbling on about God knows what, she said, “Oh, you’re a perfectionist, aren’t you?” Ten years later and her reaction has grown in my mind to one of absolute disgust, even horror, her upper lip curling in that way it does when we say “Ew, gross!” to the stench of road kill or your little brother chasing you around with a bugar on his finger.
During editing I Googled perfectionism and was relieved to find that I am not at the pathological end of the perfectionist spectrum, but I am on it: I fear failure, disapproval, and making mistakes; have unrealistic expectations and standards; and prefer order and organization. It does make it difficult to finish things and make decisions (cuz there’s always something better out there. Once it took me two years to find the right bedspread. I actually bought it twice. MA had to come over and tell me it was “good enough” and move on. I still use a TV tray we got for our wedding 26 years ago for a nightstand because I can’t find exactly what I want. I also don’t like and have little time to shop so, ya know what? The TV tray is fine for now. See, I’m getting better.)
BRRRRIIINNNG! Can I not answer the phone? No. I answered. I ignored the text but then when the phone rang, I thought, oh maybe something bad happened and someone really needs to get a hold of me. But I didn’t seriously think that. I was just doing the Pavlovian thing we all do with our damn devices that have replaced our desires. Isn’t that a movie or book – devices and desires? It’s something like that – I’ll have to ask my other brain when I allow myself to Google after my 30 minutes. (It’s an Adam Dalgliesh mystery I read by P.D. James. Excellent mystery series, by the way).
My little brother really used to do that bugar thing. Buggar. Buger. I’m not sure how that’s spelled and neither does spell check. Oh, yeah, maybe it’s booger. Yep, no red squiggle under that one. I chalk up the misspelling to having not written the word or read about boogers for a very long time. I hate boogers, even though I know we all have them and it’s just a bodily fluid but I do absolutely despise them. One of my biggest fears is having one I see in someone’s nose actually fly out when they exhale and land on me. This would be an “Ew, gross!” moment.
Wow, how quickly I become juvenile. I’m actually having fun, laughing all by myself as I pound away on the keys here in my office/guest room that no one sleeps in but me when Mark snores or I have insomnia.
I hope this blog will break me of my perfectionism in writing, and free me to finally write the books and stories and articles I’ve started or thought about for so many years. I can actually find the journal entry where I wrote my very first bucket list and it included write a book. It doesn’t matter if anyone ever reads my blog, though of course I hope someone does and enjoys it, at least a little. I honestly don’t know why anyone would read what I write. I mean, I don’t read anyone else’s blogs. But that’s partly because I don’t have or make the time. I don’t want to sit at a computer or holding a device any longer than the 8 hours I already do for work. I don’t want to get into the time thing write now. That’s a whole ‘nother blog and my 30 minutes is up. I’m not even going to read this first one now, like I usually would and then edit it to hell and destroy it. That phone call was my friend Jen asking if I wanted to come over and swim. It’s 90 degrees and I do so I’m going. And I wrote today so I deserve it! Yay! And it was easy! I feel happy and hopeful. I CAN do it!
Fiftyish and Feisty 
This is great, so happy and proud for you.
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