Hitting the Wall

Where I am tonight:

Coming up against my limits.

There are still things left on my list of things to do.

First priority is finishing an audiobook before I leave for New York, and I realize that’s not going to happen. My voice is tired, my body is fatigued, my eyes are burning. I’m going to let my publisher down by not getting the book done when I said I would, and this is my first project for this publisher, so that’s particularly bad news.

APAC planning is nearing completion, but there are still things that need  to be finalized for the conference next Wednesday. I’ve very much enjoyed the planning process, especially working with all the wonderful people in my industry to create excellent programming for attendees. It’s going to be great, but still, I feel anxious. What if it bombs (only my part, of course)? It could be a disaster. I mean, a hundred things would have to go wrong for it to really be a disaster, but I suppose it could happen!  That would be a disaster for me personally, and I’ve been working on this since November, and intensively since February. I’m nervous.

My best friend, I’ll call her Esperanza, learned tonight that I’m gone all next week, which she didn’t realize, and the day I return, she leaves for Italy, so I won’t see her until July. This is particularly painful. I just phoned her, and spent some minutes sobbing into her ear. We’ll see each other — on Skype, on Facebook, visits every other month or so, but it’s really hard to leave someone from whom I’ve lived no more than a five minute walk for the last six years.

When I left Seattle in 2001 after seven years, I didn’t say goodbye to anyone, because  I thought I’d be returning after six months. Instead, I came to Portland and fell in love and never went back, except for short, sporadic visits. For three years, I grieved the unexpected severing of my relationship with Seattle, a place I’d been passionate about since I had first visited at 14, the city that had shaped me from the age of 17 until I was 23 years old. I didn’t want to leave Portland so abruptly. I wanted to honor the people who have been so loving and supportive and generous, the place that has offered me such a nurturing spirit. So I’ve taken my time with goodbyes and thanks and expressions of love. And yet it’s meant that I’ve fallen behind, and I’m anxious, and overwhelmed, and asking what I could have done better. There are always things we can all do better, I know, and I really have been doing my absolute best, even if I am, very clearly, very imperfect.

This move is right, and it’s all going to be okay — from my first work commute on Monday to record at Random House, to APAC, to the move on the 4th. It will all come together, and be successful. But it’s still hard. My heart is still aching.