All in

I don’t do things a little bit.  I don’t eat “just this one little bite” of the cake, I eat the whole damn cake.  I don’t draw tiny flowers on paper, I make them out of fan blades and bike tires.  I go all in, or I don’t go at all.

The problem is that I get ahead of myself, and then I freak the frack out. I love the heady feeling of throwing myself into big projects, of making proclamations of the things I am going to do.  Sometimes just the planning is what I’m after, and sometimes I follow through.  Sometimes I drive 600 miles with a four year old on a whim.

It strikes out of nowhere, this insatiable need to do all the things.  I am playing on the computer, and somebody’s offhand comment ends with me researching vacation ideas for next week.  Zach is painfully familiar with emails that begin, “So I think I want to….”

I always want to be actively planning … something.  Anything, really.  Planning, but not preparing. No time for things like measuring (which is why both carpentry and sewing tend to fail me).  Right now it’s writing.  I have spreadsheets, and idea lists, and all the makings of a big freak out as I realize I’ve stepped too far, gone too big.  Expectations are my Kryptonite.

My lack of preparing means that sometimes I don’t even know how I end up where I am.  All this to say that, despite my constant instance that everyone who likes my writing is delusional at best, I have been writing for money for the last two months.  And this week I learned that one of my rowan.small.and.mighty posts will be republished (with my adaptations for a wider audience) by Scary Mommy on New Year’s Eve.

What. The…

All. In.