On time travel, and being selfish

A while back, Alex told me I had to read THE TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE. I looked at her like, What, you’re regressing back to our scifi days? Are we going to bust out with the Star Trek dolls — sorry, action figures – and play make-believe again?

Then she hit me over the head and said, No, you dope, I’m just trying to get you to read one of the most awesomest books ever.

Well, it went something like that anyway.

The book of course turned out to be fabulous — and not really scifi, although there is obviously time travel involved — and so when I stumbled across Writer Unboxed, I had to read their interview with the author, Audrey Niffenegger.

I figure writer’s block is a signal to stop working on something straight on and go at it sideways for a while.

I’m trying to put some order into my life, and not do everything for other people before I do my own work. It’s very hard to beat back the needs of other people, because taken singly, they seem so small and doable. Taken en mass they completely engulf me. So I am in the midst of attempting to make a new way for myself.

That reminds me SO much of myself, and the way I’m always dropping my own tasks to do what others ask of me. Work, parents, friends, Andy, Riley… (”Play! Let’s play! Take me outside! Wanna play?”) I always think, Oh sure, I can handle that, no big deal. And if it were just the one thing, or even the two, I probably could. But it’s never just one or two things.

It’s hard training myself to be more selfish — and more importantly, to not think of being “selfish” as bad. Really it’s more about focus, and priorities, and realistic expectations of self. I am not Superwoman, sadly. I am just me, trying to be an author.