One Track Mind

I suck at multitasking.

You know what they say.  Writers are supposed to write every day.  Yeah, I know it, but I can never manage to do it.  I get into the groove of doing one thing and that is all I can do.

Take my current project.  I needed to make a new dodger and bimini for my boat.  The big old bimini was mildewed and the stitching had all rotted away, so I figured I would replace it with a dodger and a bimini of my own design.  Sounds easy, right?  It did to me.  At first.  But now I find I am consumed by this sewing project.  I get up, eat my breakfast in a hurry and dash out to unpack my stuff.  Unlike a house, where one might have a sewing room, I do my sewing in the gazebo here at the marina.  I stow the machine and the rolls of fabric and my rolling box of equipment in my car because that is easier than getting this fifty pounds of gear on and off the boat at high tide.  Sometimes, I can barely get myself on and off the boat.  And I sew.  From morning until dusk, I am out there working on this thing.  I thought it would get done this week and tomorrow is Friday, and I haven't even finished the dodger yet.

And for some reason, everyone from the marina security guard to the dog walkers to the local park rummy has to come over and chat with me.  I want to yell, "Go away!  Can't you see I need to run this machine?"  You've heard the saying, no doubt, that some people can't walk and chew gum at the same time?  I can't sew and talk at the same time.  This thing is complicated and I'll make mistakes if I can't concentrate.  I have a one track mind.

On Monday, I'm scheduled to haul my boat out and I will shift gears from sewing to sanding and painting the bottom.  New project, new focus, new track for me to follow.  At the end of the day I'm exhausted, and when I should be writing in the evenings all I want to do is fall into my bunk.

What I really need to do is finish the revisions on this book and get it out there, but that is not the track I am on right now, and I can't manage to do a little of this and a little of that.  I envy people who can compartmentalize their days and set aside this time for that project and these hours for this.  Not me.  I have to finish this before I can start that.

And I have the additional pressure that I have to leave.  In about two weeks, I want to be en route to the Bahamas.  I need to get off the dock and stop paying these crazy slip rents now that I'm a retired pauper.

So for today, there is no lengthy, clever, heart-felt, insightful blog from me.  That's not my track.  Yeah, I quit my job, and yeah, I moved on my boat, but now I need to sew before I can write.

Fair winds!

Christine

 

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