electric mist

somebody slap me

Carl and I went out to eat tonight at one of my favorite restaurants, and talked a lot about the new business thing. The partner guy is so pumped, he's gearing up big time -- he has already found several of the items we need (big, expensive things) for waaaay below what we had expected to pay. He's just that good at this, has a million jillion business contacts and knows how to find things. (Like one item we need is normally very expensive -- $60,000! And he knew a chemical plant who had that item and didn't want it anymore -- it was in their way. So they sold it to him for something like $10,000. Mind boggling.)

So this is becoming very real, very fast, and in the course of the conversation, Carl said something I should have LOVED hearing... that he couldn't wait until this took off because then I could just spend all my time writing. We would phase out the construction company to just the one item that ties directly in with this second business (and if the second business goes big enough, phase it out completely). And that way, I wouldn't have to be tied down with all of the mounds and mounds of paperwork I've been buried under for so long and you know what the absolute first thing I did was?

Pouted.

Then felt left out. Like, what am I? Chopped liver? Why didn't he want my help with this company? I'd be very good at it.

And at the same time, I'm having an out-of-body experience, wondering just what sort of crack I was on, why couldn't I just be thrilled at the opportunity? There I was spouting all this, "You don't NEED me?" crap, thoroughly confusing my husband who just wanted to make me happy and let me write full time, and there I was claiming I really really wanted to be a part of the office, no no, RUN the office, and schmooze with the clients and build up the business and TAKE OVER THE WORLD and and RUN THE UNIVERSE and....

He gave me that look. That look you give people when you know them really well and they are spiraling into the abyss of denial and that evil look pierces through all the protests.

"Yeah," he said. "I'll just bet you want to be on the phone every day to five or ten clients, arranging everything, dispatching everyone."

Oh. The phone. Gaaaaaaaaaakkkkkkkk.

(run run scream run run)

"So, what's this about, really?"

Normally, it would have taken me weeks to grok just exactly what it was about, but I'm trying harder to access what it is inside that I want. And trying to remember that want isn't a dirty word.

I thought for a minute, and realized, it was about fear. I've been pulled in so many directions for work for so long, that I haven't had much time to write and I squeeze it in between projects and phone calls and waiting up until Jake is home from a date (if I'm still able to string two words coherently together by that point, because I am usually just so tired)... that I've sort of had that busy-ness as an excuse for not having gone further, faster. And if I have all that time... with it will come expectations. From me. From (gulp) others.

Fear. (sigh)

I remember the first time I ever published something -- I got paid a whopping $75 for a feature article in the local newspaper, and I jumped up and down with more glee than anyone who's ever won a Putlizer could have imagined. And prior to writing it, I was scared lifeless and wouldn't have tried if someone (a former teacher) hadn't pushed me to try. And then I kept writing for them, and eventually was put on staff in two different divisions, and then moved on to freelancing magazine articles, and before I knew it, was Assistant Editor, then Editor, then sold to national magazines... then swtiched to screenplays... then started with the fear all over again. I hung out on screenplay boards, then met some really nice people who took me under their wing (hi Tamar) who then became great friends and pushed me and pushed me and then I landed an agent, and more stuff happened, and the whole time, fear. Fear slowed me down more than I can explain; there was so much more I could have done with so many of the opportunities in front of me, and I hesitated and didn't take advantage of them when I had the chance. And so, lost the chance to move onward, upward, too damned often.

Well, I sat there across from Carl and that look he was giving me, and I thought about it and realized, I don't have time for fear anymore. I'm damned if I'm going to let it slow me down again. Maybe it's having a doctor say they want to run a test for a brain tumor that makes you wake up to how much time you really have... and not that I think I have one (I really do not), but just hearing the words out loud? Well, suddenly, I skipped a whole lot of stalling and denial and looked Carl in the eye and said, "You're right, I don't want to be on the phone. Ever. Again. I don't want to do that paperwork. I'm sure [partner] has a fabulous CPA and as long as I can watch the books to feel secure that everything's being done right? I don't need to be doing it. Because I am a writer, and that's what I want to do. Full time. Write."

He grinned, and said, "It's about damned time."

Posted by toni at April 24, 2004 01:31 AM