MWS

I started the day in a swimming pool and ended it by talking about QUILTBAGs.

(Note: QUILTBAG is, apparently, the new LGBT: Queer, Undecided, Intersex, Lesbian, Transsexual, Bisexual, Asexual, Gay. It's more inclusive, but I am somewhat dubious. It trips off the tongue quite nicely, though.)

It wasn't a very good day. I'm not sure exactly how to explain this. I'll try.

I am still single, and I am still unemployed. I'll grant you, I've now been single and unemployed for just over a month, which isn't actually that long, but nevertheless, it's grating. As I was trying to explain to James Box on the way back from Spiritual Space, I am trying to divide my days into three factors: music, work, and sex.

Music is the easiest to explain. I'm doing a musical endeavour at the moment and, although there's no way in hell I'll tell you exactly what it is, it's not difficult to work it out, considering what time of the year it is. It's not easy to write songs, especially when you've hit a massive creative block. I think I've been doing all right, but I still need to get back into the groove of creating music. This musical endeavour is the impetus for doing that.

I don't have any work to do, but I am looking for work. And I'm doing some. More on this later.

I'm not having sex, evidently. But going to events like Spiritual Space, CCK, and talking to people about sex will have to suffice. I think that kind of counts. And, of course, writing in here counts.

So. Two days ago I applied to an online site which publishes nonfiction articles, and hires you on a freelance basis to write these articles. You write, you submit. If the article is good, it gets published - if people view it, they also view the advert on the sidebar. This generates revenue for the site, who then pay you. That's how freelance works, apparently. But, although this is slightly dubious, I like writing and I need some money, so I applied, and was accepted. That seemed easy.
But, of course, the first time I logged in as a writer, I immediately thought, "I don't want to do this." It was all a little suspect and was now totally looming over me. Oh God, what do I write? I can't write about sex, because I have ILB to do that! What do I write about? Are they watching me, expecting me to churn something out immediately? I panicked a little, and settled on the idea that I'd write about the musical endeavour I'm currently undertaking. That seemed logical.

What was less logical was that I had no ideas whatsoever about how to phrase the article until 1:12am last night. Out came the notepad and HB pencil. Scratch, scratch, scratch. Down went the words. Okay, I thought. Simple. I'll finish this article tomorrow morning, then record a song, and then I'll have the afternoon to write a post in ILB and maybe do a quick jobsearch before I go to Spiritual Space. It all seemed so easy.

Dad woke me up this morning and immediately "requested" that I go swimming with him. I did. We then went shopping and visited my gran. This took us up to lunchtime. I had a quick lunch (pizza), and then hurried to my computer to pick up on this article, because I've always been a firm believer that when you have something to write, you should do it in the light (sex blogs notwithstanding), and it gets dark earlier these days. So I did a bit of research, and ended up turning in a halfway-decent article for the editors' perusal. Hey, if it ends up buying me a drink, that's something, right?

So then I turned to music... and this is where things went wrong. I had the lyrics and the necessary instrument to make the music. I just couldn't find my guitar cables. They had gone. Entirely.

I spent hours looking in every drawer and every cupboard in every room in the house. As my very delicate plan had been thrown out of kilter again, I freaked out a bit. Not knowing what else to do, I ended up walking around in circles. I didn't want to stop moving but I needed my guitar cables to move forwards. I've always been quite meticulous with where I place my guitar cables.
Dad came and helped me look. We couldn't find them anywhere. Freaking out a bit more, I made some decaf coffee and sat reading a book. My mother returned and, after a search, actually found the cables under a pile of junk in the attic. I thanked her (actually having feared that they had genuinely gone forever), but was then faced with the decision: do I do the song now, or go to Spiritual Space?

Brian Eno says, on one of his cards, "When faced with a choice, do both." This was, in hindsight, the right course of action. It was a short track and didn't take long to do with my guitar cables back in my hand and a spark lit back into my heart. I got a later train that I'd planned, due to taking some time to make the track, but I ended up at Spiritual Space as planned and ended up discussing QUILTBAGs.

So, in the end, I did manage everything I wanted to do. But I ended up rushing a few bits of my carefully planned plan of plans, and having a mini-panic (although it wasn't a panic attack, thankfully) in the middle really didn't help. So I think the lesson here is: don't plan so much.

Writing it all out here has made it seem much more simple than it actually is. But it's helped me clear my head a bit, which is good, in a way. But I think I really do need some sleep now... I didn't get any last night, after all.