Barbara Ortagus »

All the great productivity coach guru guys are pretty consistent in saying that if you are serious about getting something done, then you need to write it down.  I am going one further by writing it down and sharing with with the world at large.  I am a horrible procrastinator.  Actually that isn’t true, I am a terrific procrastinator.  But it needs to stop, because the guilt I am feeling about my lack of productivity is eating me alive inside.  So with new further adieu here are my short term goals:

1. Clean up my PVR.  I have oodles of things that are being recorded that I doubt I will get around to watching.  I take my TV seriously and this backlog has got to be resolved.
2. Clean the rust off my violin skills.  I used to play quite a bit, but I have definitely let my enthusiasm wane as of late.  I don’t want to lost my ability completely so I need to resume where I left off.
3. Organize my photos folder.  I have been guilty of just uploading and dumping all into one directory.  That just won’t due and it is the type of thing that if you leave it for too long you will never get around to cleaning it up.  And the job certainly isn’t getting any smaller.
4. Clean up my "junk drawer" (nuff said).
5. Read A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking.  I think it is one of those books that you really have to familiarize yourself with.  Written by one of the most brilliant minds of our time I will fill immensely enriched by having exposed myself to it.
6. Get perm and coloring.  My last perm is almost completely gone now and it is well past time for another.
7. Commit to regular exercise activity.  Ha ha ha ha.

Yeah right.  I could hire a plane and sky write my intention to exercise and it still wouldn’t happen.  But a girl and dream right?

So in my last post, I confessed to being a terrible driver and shared how I recently broke my rearview mirror off as proof to those of you who were not convinced.  You are not going to believe what happened next.

I was on my way to get the mirror fixed when they car suddenly began to slow down.  Not a steady slow down, but  more of a lurching slow down.  Yep, I ran out of gas.  I was so distraught over my accident that I didn’t think to fill up which had been on my list of things to do after the oil change.

I was on kind of a busy boulevard so I really didn’t want to walk back over the bridge to look for a gas station in the retail district.  Besides it is getting colder and I wasn’t exactly dressed for a trek.  I called my poor husband and explained my predicament.  I tried to blame him for it, but that didn’t fly.  Luckily he had a break between appointments and was able to bail me out.

While I was waiting stranded on the side of the road, I was exceptionally impressed with the number of people who stopped to ask if I needed assistance.  Having my faith in the kindness of others renewed always makes me feel better.

Hubby showed up and filled my up with enough gas to make it to the next station.  I was quite late for my appointment to get the mirror fixed, but I guess they had some cancellations or something, because they were able to take me in anyway.

The job cost a little more than they had anticipated, but overall the price wasn’t too bad.  The Yukon is safe and sound in the garage now and I think it might just be best for everyone if I left it there for a while.

Something I really enjoyed when I was in high school was acting, but you know how it is.  After graduation, marriage, kids, career kinda make that sort of thing take a back seat to more pressing reality.  Well my home life has stabilized a bit lately so a few weeks ago I auditioned for a community play and was cast in a small but significant part.  The performance is still a few weeks away and I a have been busy rehearsing.

I am exciting to be back into it, but acting is coming back to me a lot less naturally than it used to.  I wonder if it is the absence of my youthful exuberance that is causing the problem.  When the whole world was a dream of possibilities it was much easier to slip into a fanciful personality and portray it convincingly.  I fear the harsh realities of life have left me jaded.

As I stopped to reflect on this, I feel that this outlook colors most facets of my existence.  I am less the dreamer and risk taker that defined me in my teens.  Now I carefully weight the pros and cons of every decision I make and I am ALOT more deliberate in my actions and choices.  I am old.  Blech.

It is difficult for me to just let go.  Just let go and live.

I am still trying to decide if this really a problem though.  While some would argue unquestionably that it is a huge, terrible loss, I am not quite convinced.  We go through several stages of metamorphosis throughout our lifetimes.  We need to in order to endure the unique challenges that each period of our lives hurls at us.

We need to be dreamers in our young adult years so that we can propel ourselves in a direction of reaching to be more than we are at that time.   When we are getting married and building families we need to be more diligent in our efforts to protect what it is that we are responsible for nurturing.  When we have grown children of our own, we need to shift in to a role of sage advisor so that we may guide our children on a path that is clear of obstacles that we have identified and conquered.

While I am looking forward to my acting gig, I am happy that I do not live a life that I feel I need to escape from.