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Musings On Being Furloughed Before Labor Day Weekend
Why can’t I finish anything?
I start. I start reading. I start writing. But for nearly thirty years I have been unable to finish a damn thing. I probably won’t finish this.
Who’s even prolific? People with agents. That’s who. The people who get their work seen by people who have the power to get their work more seen. But me? No. How can I be prolific when I can’t even finish a piece of writing and even If I did where would it go?
I’m sitting in my living room a 5:10 a.m. My cat, Roger, is crunching on the same food he’s been eating for 16 years. Must taste boring. But it’s comfortable. He knows his food. It’s not going to change on him. Except when there’s a roach or two crawling out of there. As the windowless living room I write this in has gotten hotter this summer, the roaches in his food have increased.
I guess I’ve gotten too comfortable. I remember going on a Jewish retreat in upstate New York over a decade ago. It was where I thought I’d learn the “proof” of why Judaism was the “right” religion. I didn’t find either to be true. It was a cliquey camp with some Talmud classes. But at one Shabbat dinner, a rabbi with the same last name as mine told me “never let yourself be comfortable.” Easy. I never have. But he meant “don’t get complacent.” He was right.
