Space and Spring

It hailed again yesterday. I know in my heart that that’s the sign of a Seattle spring, but there’s something about watching ice fall down from the sky that makes me think winter will never end. It has been a slog this year, people, let me tell you.

And not just the weather. I submitted my latest manuscript to my editor two weeks ago and that was a slog too. I told her it would be done by the new year, then by January 15th, then February 1. Then I finally gave up the ghost and told her I would get it to her when I got it to her, and I was so sorry for being a flake. She, delightful woman that she is, said, “I think it’s a good sign when artists don’t always make deadlines. It helps me know they’re not robots.”

This manuscript was certainly not robotic. It was annoying. I could complain on and on but the worst part of it is, instead of feeling celebratory when I sent it off, all I felt was a combination of relief and disappointment. I just didn’t want to have to work on it anymore.

It’s been two weeks since then, a mandatory break enforced by school schedules and family visits, and I still mostly feel relief and disappointment. But the more space I have from the project, the more I think that when it comes back to me again (after the first round of editing), the more I can look at it with fresh eyes.

That feeling, that needing of space, is one I am getting accustomed to requiring. I’m a fairly impulsive person, not in the “buy a motorcycle” kind of way but in the “sure, I can take on one more thing” kind of way. That worked for me for a long time, but in the last year, I’ve had health issue after health issue and while none of them are serious, all of them require me to take more space. No longer can I put off a meal, or stay up an extra hour, or deliberately dehydrate myself on a plane so I don’t have to ask people to get up so I can use the bathroom.

Yes, that one’s embarrassingly true.

I was flying home this weekend, in a window seat, and usually, when that happens, I choose to drink as little as I have to so that I don’t need to use the bathroom. Yes, I get off the plane with a raging headache, even a migraine. Yes, I usually spend the next day feeling like crap. And yes, I feel bad when despite that effort, I need to get up at least once on a six hour flight.

But this time, I didn’t. I simply asked people to move, to give me the space I needed to go to the bathroom. And it’s possible they felt inconvenienced. But their convenience was not more important than my needs.

It makes me think. How many small things do I do to keep from being an inconvenience? How often do I deny myself very basic things just so I don’t have to ask for something? I’m not talking about manners, or common courtesy, or being respectful. In fact, I think pushing myself to the limit of what I need makes me less courteous. When my needs are met, when I don’t feel overwhelmed, I can be kind, I can be flexible, I can be thoughtful. But all of those things require space. Space to think, space to feel, space to accept that I am not completely self-sufficient.

In the two weeks since I sent my manuscript in, I have not had a ton of rest time. That’s not in the cards when my kids are on break. But I have had space from my work. Space to think through what was hard and plan differently for next time. Space to build my willpower back up for the inevitably difficult editing process. Space to remember that just because a project is frustrating doesn’t mean it’s bad.

And space to remind myself that just like this winter, every difficult project ends. And like a hailstorm, the signs of life might be a little different than I expect.