Focus - Must Make a Better List

It is November 13th. It has been eight days since my last post. On my refrigerator door there is a message board. There I keep track of long term goals and daily tasks.

I am nearly finished with a painting I've been working on for around a year, maybe longer. And two others are calling to me to finish them as well.

I decided to get started on formatting my art book and also a book of writings.

On my list of daily tasks was Paint and Write. And I'd think today, I will make some real headway. And I'd take care of my daily chores and take Coco for a walk and rake the yard but I couldn't seem to focus on anything in particular to write or find my way back to the canvas.

I think when I am in focus I should make the lists more detailed. Start a file for the book and copy and past my work in it. And begin the formatting process one step at a time. I think the Art Book is too confusing to do. Putting the art stories and lines together with images of my work is daunting. Now is when I wish I could pay someone to help me through it. It has been over a year since I published, "Down the Road." Since I've used the InDesign program. Since the writings are already edited I think it will be best to work on that and get my feet muddied first before attempting to work on the other.

Ever since the accident, a driving motivation that has helped me keep going has been a sense of urgency. I must finish this painting before I die. I must finish this page, this chapter and this book before I kick the bucket and all of the work I have done thus far will be left, undone.

And so for the past two years I've been in the process of finishing. Other than this blog I haven't written much new. I've edited. And painted but not much seems to leave these walls. And when I do get a book reading and signing it takes so much work to reach the right people and prepare and get there and all of that energy and focus prevents me from keeping the momentum I need to have mentally, to get things done.

And then I think, but what if I don't have that long to get this all done? What if something happens? What if I get lost in this nothingness and all that I've done is all I will do? This has been an ongoing train of thought since the brain injury. It took so much work to get this far. And with each accomplishment I felt like popping a cork of champagne and celebrating and declaring, "Ha! I've done it! One more project I've outlived!" And always there awaits another in the wings.

I have put a more detailed list on my daily task side of the board on my refrigerator. And tomorrow I will punch through the cellophane that keeps me from advancing ever so steadily toward finishing those things I refuse to leave, undone.