Cast a Wide Net

My life has changed considerably.

Two months ago today, I walked off Chatham University property for the last time as a student. It was great, and it was sad. So ended the stress. So ended the process of getting where I wanted to go. So ended my immediate and easy ability to connect with a community of like-minded people.

And so began something new.

But that ending and all of its sweet relief was deceptive. Now, I'm adrift. Now, I realize that I have no immediate goals, no pressing deadlines. And more importantly, I have no one to direct me. It's been a long time since I was my own boss. On July 25, 2006, my most demanding superior was born, and until the day I began at Chatham in the fall of 2014, he (and his brother) dictated my every action. I met their deadlines. I did what they asked of me. I gave them what they required. So, while moving from that sort of environment to one in which I worked for teachers felt different, it really wasn't different at all. I still had to get things done. I still had to complete my job. Plug away.

Grad school taught me how well I work under a deadline. Now, I'm just sort of floating around out here. The kids are in their school. I'm left to gather the things I've learned about writing and about myself in the last decade and mold some sort of life for myself. And, being just a bit anxiety-ridden and a tad impatient, I'm not handling it very well.

Harumph

I decided to cast a wide net. I'm one of the blog editors for Literary Mama. I do freelance blogging. I help a friend teach third graders how to write personal narratives. I try to write on my own, too, while fighting off the difficulties of Sjogren's Syndrome that really flare up in the fall. I haven't seen other human beings for two years, so I'm trying to do that, and I'm a little squishy in the midsection too. So, yoga. Rather than a singular focus (thesis), I've divided myself up into many varied parts. I know I want to write. It took me 35 years to narrow my existence down to that singularity. Of all the things in the world I could do, writing was it.

But now that I've arrived in this place, I realize that the horizon has just expanded exponentially again, to a world almost as big as the one I knew three years ago. Do I want to stay at home and work on my book? Teach little kids? Teach big kids? Freelance for money? Focus on blog editing and publishing? The singularity exploded into an unexpected field of choices, all of which baffle me and tempt me. Thus, the wide net, or as my friend Amanda said, "Throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks."

The problem is that I've caught too many fish in the net. Some keepers, some trash fish, some tin cans. And now I've got this heavy-ass net slung over my back and not enough time to deal with the contents. I have fewer free moments in the day than I did during thesis time, and I'm getting paid for very few of my efforts.

Shawn tells me I need to pay my dues. Write, publish, teach, help out. Casually toss my name out there. Work on my book but not kill myself. Fight to stay ahead of my autoimmune problems. Go outside. He's right, of course. I stayed in my office, writing for school, for two years. In that time I amassed very few life experiences. The idea jar is empty. I need to fill it back up.

I fish. I know how many times I have to cast before I get a bite. I know how many lures I lose, how many snags take my rig. Fishing infuriates me. Some days I don't catch shit. Once in a blue moon, I land a whopper.

I may need a little help getting this jig out of the tree.