A full plate

Earlier today I finished a fascinating interview that Tim Ferriss did with Penn Jillette. One of the things that I found most interesting was his journaling habit that he’s done daily for over thirty years. He begins each morning spending about half an hour writing about the conversations that he had the day before and some of the things that he did. He said he writes about half to a thousand words, then finishes up by reading the diary entries from one year ago, five, ten and so on years ago. It seems to me that it’s quite a way to keep track of one’s life and find out what one was doing, and how one’s grown.

I think ideally I’m still trying to make this blog a diary of sorts. Having a daily writing habit is good practice and keeps my mind sharp, but at the same point I don’t see that the content here would be of much use to anyone other than myself in some regards. I don’t want to get into the minutiea of who I talked to and so forth, but I aim to say something true each day, and hope that I’ll be struck by some sort of creative impulse that will mean something more than my particular day. I tell myself if I just keep writing, things will develop on their own. We’ll see.

I’ve been trying to maintain my routine, getting up early enough that I don’t have to rush, trying to maintain a balance between early morning productivity and my late-night tendencies. Trying to juggle all the responsibilities that I’ve somehow managed to saddle myself with, and still find time to do what I want to do. Being a parent is probably the most important job that I have, and it’s made harder by the fact that I only have less than three hours with my children each weekday. We recently picked up the idea of “special time” from one of the discipline books that I picked up to help deal with some defiance issues that my eldest is having. It’s fifteen minutes a day that the kids are in charge. Right now all they want to do during that time is for me to give them horsey rides, or toss them around with my feet, doing front and backflips onto the floor or couch cushions. We’ve been experimenting with me holding their feet in my hands while they stand and I push them up in the air above me. Needless to say I have been sore and feeling beat up for several days.

I’ve had some physical discomfort in my shoulder the past few days. I can’t tell if it’s due to the aforementioned horse-play, or a repetitive stress issue due to leaning on my elbow while at my desk. Or it could be strain from the increased amount of piano practice that I’ve been doing. I’ve got a couple short classical pieces memorized that I’m polishing up and hope to have a video up soon. I’ve been spending a good deal of time throughout the day at the keys, and have been slowly improving over the past few weeks. Emphasis on slowly; just earlier I was able to complete a short Bach minuet without any flubs. I’ve probably been practicing it for weeks.

I’m also fighting the nagging feeling that I may have taken on too much and that I’m going to be very, very busy soon. I’m maintaining right now, but a meeting last week looks like it may lead to a partnership that could lead to a lot of opportunity. I just have to balance my past obligations, which are so low on the backburner right now that they may wind up burning me if I don’t stay ahead of it.

Other than that, it’s just breathe in, breathe out. I’m doing fine.