Stiff is how I feel today, in mind and body. The other day I did a bit of house-cleaning that taxed my abilities, and by house-cleaning I mean cleaning the accumulated dirt, algae, and glunk off the siding on three sides of my house. (I can't reach the fourth side without a ladder, and I'm enough of a klutz to know that carrying a long-handled sponge mop and bucket up a ladder will only end in disaster.)
I don't remember when I last cleaned the siding, but it's been long enough to allow my light-gray house to appear to be growing a green beard on the shady spots. I don't want to use the power-washer because the siding was installed by a previous owner who did every home-improvement task in the cheapest and sloppiest possible way, so there are many spaces where a pressure-washer could force lots of water under the siding, which is not optimal. In the past I've used a bucket of cleanser and rags, but this time I repurposed an old sponge mop so I could reach higher with less strain on my shoulders and arms.
I know no one really wants to do such an annoying task much less read about it, but if my entire upper body hurts today, maybe you'll understand why. Also, I found a nest of hornets. Also, I broke the mop. BUT: it's now possible to sit on the back deck without wondering when the fuzzy green beard on the siding is going to develop sentience and take over the planet.
I'd love to be sitting out there right now thinking deep thoughts and writing them down, but the stiffness that suffuses my body seems to have also crippled my mind. I've been writing steadily for nearly three hours at Writing Wednesday but I don't see a single sentence that makes me light up with pride or want to share it with a reader.
I'm still at the getting-it-down stage of this writing project, writing as quickly as possible without concern for details, and I see lots of sentences studded with little parenthetical notes like add example or get quote or what year? It's still not clear to me exactly what shape this thing (essay? analysis? pile of dangling insights?) will take, but I've settled on a controlling metaphor that gives me hope that it will all cohere in the end. Yellowjackets are involved. In fact, one of my parenthetical notes asks are yellowjackets cooperative? Guess I need to look some stuff up before my next writing session.
Despite my stiffness, I'm pleased to see that I've produced close to 9,000 words, which is kind of a lot for a piece that doesn't really fit into any preconceived categories. Progress is being made, one chunk of verbiage at a time, and if that progress looks a little sloppy and unpolished, it coordinates nicely with the whole rest of my life right now.
I think I'll have one more week in the getting-it-down stage before I turn toward the cleaning-it-up stage, at which point I'll need answers to all those parenthetical questions. I won't need ladders or mops or buckets, just a supple mind and some swiftly-moving fingers. I wake up every morning with fingers so stiff I can barely grab my glasses, but a long bout of typing limbers them up nicely. I only hope it's limbering up my brain cells at the same time.
No comments:
Post a Comment