Ode to Procrastination
Will the real procrastinators please stand up?
After being lost in a sea of nothingness, you come up for air. A swell of disorientation washes over you.
How long were you out for?
You stare at the Google Doc on your laptop. The cursor pulsates against the blank screen.
You blink a few times, then pick your eye corner. A small crusty crumbles. It’s a momentary reprieve.
You settle deeper into your chair, wriggling your cheeks back and forth.
To demonstrate discipline, you slide your phone behind your laptop.
“Out of sight out of mind,” you mumble.
Have you become someone who talks aloud? You’re closer to being a victim of elder abuse than you care to imagine.
You snap back. To honour your shoulder’s angel, you close every open tab:
Realtor.
Facebook Marketplace.
WebMD.
Kayak.
A “How old was Bobby Christina when she died?” Google search.
You skim the Bobby C article, but you already know the answer: 22. You’re not fooling anyone.
You glance down at your Yeti mug. Your coffee is lukewarm. It’s confirmation that your doom scroll lasted longer than intended.
Is it possible to disable your phone’s screen time tracker? You grab your phone to confirm your daily average.
3 hours and 13 minutes?! Do podcasts count?
Either way, this is not how you were raised.
Suddenly, your Bravo TV ritual flashes before you. Your breath tightens. There are countless hours of big screen time that your little screen doesn’t even know about!
You allow your bottom lip to fall, feigning a depressed gasp of horror.
Beaten down and wild, you let a strain of nauseating logic “pass go”.
Think little screen gets jealous of big screen?
You hate yourself for even entertaining this.
Why should it? Little screen gets to come with us to the toilet and on planes.
You slam your fist onto the table, mimicking a judge’s gavel. Case closed!
Disturbed, you massage your temples before catching your reflection inside a picture frame. With your pinkie, you yank up your eyebrow. Is this what an eyebrow lift would look like?
You have just enough in you to prevent a “GTA eyebrow lift” search.
You take a deep breath.
It’s time to get it together. And believe it or not, you consider yourself a productive person.
You’re a taxpayer.
A daughter.
A sister.
A wife.
A friend.
A philanthropist (okay, not this last one).
You manage to corral focus back to the Google doc.
You remind yourself that this is for you. It’s a privilege to write. It’s a privilege to make anything.
And if the end product sucks? That’s fine. You can’t unearth gold without heading into the mine. If you emerge sooty, clutching only a hanky of hardboiled eggs with a leg crushed by fallen debris, so what?
At least you tried.
Inspired by your own pep talk, you begin to type a stream of consciousness. It’s a good release and it’s flowing.
A few minutes pass. Then, you remember that you’re needed elsewhere. You forgot to heart a Boston Terrier vid that your colleague sent.
It’s a new friendship, and the ink on the social contract is still drying. You can’t leave them hanging. The guilt would eat you alive!
Even though you didn’t find the video particularly charming (the Boston had a schnoz that belonged to a Beagle), they tried.
And trying is everything.
You name the doc “Ode to Procrastination”, then release yourself.