The other day when fog swirled through the valley, I hopped in my car (petulant teenager in tow) and set off to capture it with my camera.
The fog was temperamental. Sometimes it seemed to hang in place, and other times it moved so fast I could see it whipping by, tendrils flying like hair in the wind. I drove around one of my running loops, stopping whenever I found a beguiling patch of thick air. I kept having run-ins with school buses: once I met one head-on and was forced to drive backwards down the curvy country road until I found a spot wide enough to pull over and let it pass; the other time I was snapping a photo when I heard the telltale roar coming from behind and had to leap into my car and stomp on the gas.
Sometimes I wonder why I keep working on this book. What drives me? The publisher that kicked off the whole process is no longer in business (and I had never signed a contract), so there’s no outside motivation, no one holding a cracking whip. Yet still, on I plod. Two, three, four mornings a week spent sending my (younger) children away so I can write a book about the homeschooling I’m not doing.
Most days I feel like I’m trying to do the impossible: harness fog. My experiences and ideas swirl heavily through my mind, pressing me into my seat (or making me want to hide under it). How to seize the elusive and distill it into something tangible, logical, readable? This baffles me. Frustrates me, too. My ineptitude looms, jagged and terrifying. I feed myself lies: you’ve got this, I growl through gritted teeth. Forever hunting clarity, I toy with mere wisps of ideas, twisting and turning them into words, willing them into something bigger than the sum of their parts.
So many hours spent stubbornly tugging at tendrils. It’s foolishness, yes? So why do I persist? My answer, the only one I can think of, is this: hope. Crazily enough, it really does spring eternal.
This same time, years previous: a taste, one-pot macaroni and cheese, and then I turned into a blob, school: the verdict, blame it on the cats, to read, addictive and relaxing, a round about compliment, chai-spiced hot chocolate, hauling wood, and my me-me list.
7 Comments
Fiona
Ahh wisps of elusive fog….it is both beautiful, and your right hopeful and somehow soothing! Here the mist rises off the Green River to the south and it always looks so perfect!
Jennifer Jo
Eek! Thank you for catching my mistake!
dr perfection
Life is short. If you don't want to write the book, don't do it. You are doing enough other hard things. Be happy.
Anonymous
Amazing photos!!
Second Sister
I love these photos. And I love you, friend. But I didn't get (or don't buy) the part about "you've got this" being a lie ;). Next inspirational photo shoot could be birds because "hope is the thing with feathers…" My Mom gave me a little plastic bird feeder for Christmas. A month and a half it's clung by its suctions to my back patio door with nary a visitor. I was on the phone with my mother the other day and I saw the very first chicadee pop by. Whoop! Whoop! I couldn't stop laughing with delight! Hope.
Jennifer Jo
Reading your comment, I could actually HEAR you laugh. Warmed me right up, your laugh did.
Becky
You're doing this because it's a goal you set and you must see it through. So like the old commercial said, "Just Do It".