Did anyone else ever want to be Samantha in Bewitched when you were growing up... or was that just me? (Or even Jeannie in I Dream of Jeannie? I mean, she DID have the sexier wardrobe, even though the network censors made Barbara Eden cover her navel because America wasn't ready for her cleavage, her pouty lips, AND her bare navel... there are LIMITS, people.)
Growing up in the mid-to-late 1960s, my little sister and I used to pretend we were one or the other, but most often it was Bewitched. Decades before Harry Potter and friends put a magical world in front of our very eyes, Samantha, Endora, Uncle Arthur and Aunt Hagatha were the bomb. And we wanted to have that kind of power to do anything from magically cleaning our rooms (wouldn't THAT have come in handy?) to making that nasty boy around the corner -- the one who hurled rock-hard ice balls at me and put big red welts on my legs one winter's day -- disappear. I remember that once, we found a book that purported to have actual witches potions in them, but they looked too complicated or required items we couldn't locate -- I mean, where DOES a 9-year-old find Bat Wings, anyway?
So, we gave up on the potion-making (I barely passed chemistry in high school so it was probably a good thing I wasn't trying to conjure up magical home remedies) and stuck to trying to perfect our nose-wriggle à la Samantha. Was Elizabeth Montgomery not just the most adorable thing when she wriggled her nose? And it's harder than it looks, too. I think we secretly hoped that whatever we were trying to "magic" into our lives, we had just enough magic of our own within us to make it happen with just a twitch.
In real life, of course, you must remember this... a twitch is just a twitch, a sigh is just a sigh... and Samantha can play it again on the reruns, but we can't move our noses and have things happen just the way we want them. It usually takes something more than nasal wish-fulfillment. You've got roll up your sleeves once in a while and DO something to make your magical dreams come true.
Wishing to be a successful author won't make me one. You know, just by way of a random, impersonal example. Must as I love writing my blog, I don't get paid to do so. I don't get paid to write my little tweets or Facebook posts, either. (Although if someone knows of a job where someone WOULD pay me to do that sort of writing, let me know ASAP because that would be one freaking cool gig.) I can sit here in front of my computer and imagine having my vision of the perfect writer's life -- which sometimes takes the form of Diane Keaton's schizo laughing/crying "Je cherche un homme" writer's binge in Something's Gotta Give, but hey she gets to DO all that in an amazing Hamptons beach house)... but unless I manage to WRITE THE DAMN BOOK, none of that is going to happen.
You have no doubt intuited a certain tone of frustration in my virtual voice, and that frustration is 100% all directed at myself. As a former life coach, I frequently worked with people who were stuck in the middle of achieving a huge personal or professional goal (and inevitably there is such a sticking point for pretty much everyone) -- yet I can't seem to un-stick myself no matter what I do. I've tried taking a step back; I've tried all the coaching talk; I've even tried guilting myself. Georges has given me all manner of great pep talks, coaching and serious discussions about it. I've tried writing in different places, and do find I'm more productive writing in noisy cafes than in my own empty apartment -- but this last one seems to work much like exercise with me: once I'm out there doing it, I'm fine, but it's the GETTING ME OUT THE DOOR TO DO IT IN THE FIRST PLACE that is the problem. Which partially explains why I'm overweight. But if I'm a real writer, shouldn't I really be able to write ANYWHERE, especially at home? If I'm committed to making this dream happen, why I am not willing to do what it takes to get it done?
The long and the short of it is, I think I've been looking for -- waiting for -- something magical to happen to motivate me. When maybe I need to stop twitching my nose (I am not a rabbit) and treat writing more like a job commitment I've made. When I used to work in someone else's business, or even when I was self-employed, my employers and clients could depend on me to follow through and finish the job at hand. I was no slacker! Yet when it comes to writing for myself alone, I am no where near as driven or directed. And I find that very odd, as well as frustrating.
Mainly I am sick and tired of making excuses to myself, to Georges, and to everyone around me about why the book isn't FINISHED. I want to BE the Diane Keaton-type of writer (well, maybe without the lunatic crying jags) who is so totally energized by her own brilliance that she's up and down and on the move even when she's sitting at her computer. But I also want to be the type of writer who is willing to do the (sometimes even harder) grunt work of the writing process, where you have to edit for endless hours to try and get your work as near as possible to something approaching perfect. Whatever "perfect" looks like these days. Lastly, I want to be the type of writer who stops whining about how she can't seem to finish her book, and simply goes out and DOES IT, ALREADY... and I'm sure we'd all appreciate that.
So it's Halloween, and I'm just feeling like a real, uh, b witch about this right now. But I wish you a happy/crazy/scary/fun Halloween and some good trick-or-treatin'. Be safe, and (if you're in the northeastern US) be warm and wear your snow boots with your costume.
