So Maybe I’m Not Trapped in the Body of a Ninety Year Old…

I tend to do weird things when I have writer’s block and access to the Interwebs. Tonight, I was feeling kind of down because I hadn’t posted to the blog since Friday and couldn’t think of anything to write. And I haven’t done any work this weekend on either Novel #1 or Novel #2, so my shame spiral was spinning ever more quickly downward. But then I stumbled upon one of those websites that purports to tell you your real age–”real age” being your biological age based on health and living habits–and suddenly everything turned around.

Because lo and behold, despite my aches and pains and allergies and general grumpiness about the world and everything in it most days, I’m a full two years younger biologically than I am chronologically. Add this to the fact that people tell me that I look like I’m fifteen (which I guess is a compliment but I don’t know–is it a good thing to look like a fifteen year old these days? Oh, hell–I’ll take it), and apparently I must be doing something right.

Does this site have any medical credibility whatsoever? Frankly, I don’t know. Nor do I particularly care, because according to them, I’ve just snatched two years back from the jaws of death! So yea for me! I’m already calculating ways to get myself down to being biologically twenty-five by the end of the summer (with an ass to match, hopefully). By Christmas, I hope to be back in third grade.

Seriously though, this test did a pretty good job of telling me a bunch of things I already know about my life and then boiling it down to that big fat number none of us can escape–age. I know my diet consists of not enough fruit and too much chocolate. I know that when I’m at work, walking from my desk to the bathroom doesn’t really count as exercise. I know that French fries, no matter how much I try to will them to be so, are not a food group. And, yes, I know I need to see an allergist–apparently, not controlling my allergies was one of those things that prevented my biological age from being even lower. Who knew allergies can actually age you? Bring on the shots–stat!

But what I was happy to see was that some of my Nervous Nelly behaviors–such as not using my cell phone while driving and only driving a few miles over the speed limit–may actually be lengthening my life (and if speeding while talking on a cell phone really does shorten one’s life, then I know a few people who should have died years ago. Seriously. I mean, half the people driving in New York City should have a biological age of 4,786 just based on these two categories alone.). And, apparently, having a wide circle of friends and a happy marriage contribute to a long life as well, although considering as I was taking the test for myself I was mentally answering the questions for several of my friends and guessing what their scores would be, I would venture that my social circle will be much smaller in about fifteen years as all of my friends will be dead.

So knowing that I’m really, deep, deep down inside two years younger than I thought I was isn’t going to help me sell Novel #1 or finish Novel #2, and it isn’t going to help me make this blog any more interesting, nor will it landscape the jungle mascarading as my lawn, finish the projects I have sitting on my work calendar for this week, or clean my house. But right now, on a Sunday night when I’m sitting around bummed at the end of another weekend of non-accomplishment, the discovery of my newfound youth is no small victory, and tonight I’ll go to bed happy (which should lower my age by at least another few months).

Trapped in the Body of a Ninety Year Old

I haven’t posted much since last week, and for a very good reason.

My body has declared war on me.

Now, before I launch into a several paragraphs-long whine-fest, I’d just like to state that I’m a pretty lucky girl. I’m not hungry. I’m not homeless. I have people who love me and I’m gainfully employed. I could go on and on and on. But one fact right now is trumping all of this.

I am in constant pain.

Today, it’s a double-whammy of my sinuses and my back-neck-shoulders, and it’s the second half of this power couple to which I’m doing the greatest disservice right now by typing. Call it dedication–like the Marquis de Sade writing with his own excrement because his writing tools had been taken away, I just keep right on writing because it’s just too weird not to (okay, maybe not just like the Marquis. He wrote with excrement. What I write usually is excrement. It’s a tenuous connection at best). And I know that with every word I type, I’m probably doing more damage to my fingers, my wrist, my neck, and my back.

Then to add insult to injury (literally), I did even more damage to my back yesterday by putting together a laptop table that was supposed to help me make my workspace at home more ergonomic–I flipped the table over and pulled a lower back muscle. Irony abounds.

So I try to engage in activities that don’t involve stressing out any of my back-neck-shoulder muscles on the right side. I watch TV, my hand and wrist swaddled in a brace to keep my wrist firm. I clean the house, gingerly, using my left hand to dust and wipe and swiffer (if “swiffer” isn’t a verb, then it should be. “Swiff,” maybe?). I eat snacks, thinking about how I’d rather be working out but I can’t because every time I do, I end up hurting myself. I think about the novel I’m not sending out query letters for, because I can’t spend long hours in front of the computer anymore when I’m not at work. I think about the essays I’m not writing and posting on this blog for the one or two people who actually read them. I think about the second novel I’m not working on because typing just hurts too much. I think about the yardwork and landscaping I’m not doing because it hurts too much to bend over. I think about all the activities I’m not doing because I’ll end up paying for them–literally paying, with a trip to the chiropractor–tomorrow.

I think about how I might cheat on my chiropractor with a physical therapist, but I don’t want to add another co-payment to my list of monthly bills (and I really should go see an allergist as well for my sinus problem, as I’ve apparently moved to the allergy capital of the world and I’ve been told by those in the know that the symptoms are just going to get worse).

And I think, again, how lucky I am in so many aspects of my life. And I think about how long my life is going to be if I’m not even forty years old but I’m moving around as if I’m ninety.

And I think that even though I’m one of the luckiest girls in the world, I’m sad, and I understand how people in constant pain are also in a constant state of depression. I have good and bad days, and today is just really, really bad.

So if anyone out there is in the same situation, I hear you. And if you have any suggestions or links for exercises or anything that helps alleviate carpal tunnel or back pain, feel free to share.

Whine over.

And the winner is…

Well, the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award competition finally has a winner. And if you’ve been following along, you know it’s not me (otherwise, I wouldn’t be polluting my blog with my novel).

But do support the winner. Publishers Weekly asks if he’s the new Dennis Lehane. Buy it and see for yourself.

Speak Loudly and Carry a Big Guitar

Every time there’s an election in this country, it happens—celebrities come out and endorse this candidate or that, and the rest of us down here in the Valley of the Ordinary are left to debate whether or not an endorsement from one of the rich and famous should really matter in politics.

Debate is probably an overstatement, actually. More like a bunch of people get on the Internet and screech at each other:

Person #1: I don’t give a *$!@% what [insert celebrity name here] thinks. Do the candidates really think I’m so stupid that a celebrity endorsement will make me vote for someone? These people need to shut up and play their guitars and make their movies and stop voicing their stupid opinions.

Person #2: But celebrities have opinions, too, and wouldn’t we rather they throw their fame behind candidates and causes instead of buying more sports cars and toy dogs? Isn’t a celebrity endorsement worth it if it gets one more person involved in the political process and encourages someone to choose a candidate?

Person #1: No. You’re a douche.

Person #2: Shut up. You’re a douche.

And so on and so on.

This issue is on my mind because one of my musical obsessions, Dave Matthews, has come out in support of Barack Obama, posting a thoughtful endorsement of the candidate on his band’s official website, giving interviews about his support of Obama, and—along with longtime collaborator Tim Reynolds—playing a free show at Indiana University to raise awareness of Obama’s campaign last Sunday night (April 6). And I’ll just admit right now that if Dave Matthews stood on stage in front of me and sang the dictionary from A to Z in falsetto, that would be just fine by me, so I’m a little biased. And I’ll also admit that I’m an Obama supporter, but I’d already made up my mind before The Dave came out with his endorsement. Like Obama Girl, I pretty much made up my mind about Obama after watching his speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention, which I then watched a second time when it was rerun on C-Span.

Let me just repeat that. I watched a rerun of a political speech. On C-Span. And I’m often of the mind that my satellite provider should be paying me to have C-Span, not the other way around.

So I was intrigued to say the least. And then I started learning more about him and his positions, and I was sold. So when Dave Matthews came out as an Obama supporter, the effect of the endorsement was that I was really proud to be a fan of Dave Matthews and the Dave Matthews Band because his political positions are in line with mine.

But Person #1 and Person #2 above aren’t arguing about the effect of celebrity endorsements on someone like me. What they’re arguing about is the effect of a celebrity endorsement on someone who is on the fence or hasn’t made up his/her mind yet. And I’ve seen plenty of arguments on the Internet over the past few days in relationship to the Dave Matthews/Tim Reynolds show along the lines of the fictional one above (albeit with no capital letters and worse spelling). These arguments inevitably devolve into ad hominem attacks against the candidates (all of them) and against Dave Matthews himself (My personal favorite: the person on some website laughing at the Obama campaign trying to get publicity from a Dave Matthews concert because it’s not 1994 and nobody cares about Dave Matthews and his band anymore. Right. Which explains why they’re one of rock’s top-grossing touring acts–with some of the lowest ticket prices, and you can search Billboard year-end stats for proof–every year. Because nobody cares anymore).

In some ways, both #1 and #2 are right. You shouldn’t give a *$!@%, to some extent, what Dave Matthews thinks (and part of me can’t believe I just wrote that) any more than you should give a *$!@% what anyone thinks. You should make up your mind about things based upon the best available information. But in an age of 24-hour news and the Internet (complete with bloggers like me trying to fill your mind with who knows what), there’s so much information that the best available information is pretty damn hard to discern. And while you shouldn’t automatically default to the position of “I like Dave Matthews, so I’ll have what he’s having,” if the power of a celebrity endorsement makes you curious enough to find out more information about a candidate or a cause while you’re on your way to making up your mind, then I think that’s just great.

Because here’s the thing: as much as some of them come off that way sometimes, celebrities aren’t just dancing monkeys (or Proudest Monkeys or Dancing Nancies, for that matter) here to do the public’s bidding. The rich and famous have to live in this country, too. They get to vote right along with the rest of us and live with the consequences, and as such, they should get to have their say. And for better or worse, their say ends up being a little bit louder that the rest of ours simply because of who they are. But what they have to say certainly isn’t any more or less important. And just as we can choose not to go to their movies or buy their music, we can choose to ignore celebrity opinions just as firmly as they have the right to express them.

            

Thought for the Day (or maybe the week, or maybe this is the thought that will define my life)…

There’s no point in being good at something if you don’t enjoy doing it.

Think about that for a minute.

I had this epiphany yesterday at work. Several people were complimenting me because I had just finished (well, almost finished) this big project and had apparently aquitted myself well. And as one of my co-workers was telling me “Hey, you’re really good at that (I’m being purposefully vague here, not because my job involves super-secret spy missions or anything but because I’d rather keep my work life and my blog life as separate as I can. And overall, I love my job), I suddenly just blurted out–”And I hated every minute of doing it.”

But we do things sometimes, you know, because we have to. So I bucked up and did this thing and did it well. But I didn’t enjoy it, and I’m thankful that my job doesn’t consist solely of this type of project at which I apparently excel.

So, again, I’ll just propose that there’s no point in being good at something if you don’t enjoy doing it. And I suspect that there are a lot of unhappy people out there who are doing things just because someone says “Hey, you’re awesome at this.” I think about all the people I’ve known in my life to whom someone has said “Hey, you’re great at science. You should be a doctor.” But they don’t really enjoy science and don’t really want to be a doctor. But hey–they’re good at it and doctors make a lot of money.

Kind of makes you wonder how many unhappy doctors there are out there, huh? Well, I’m wondering that now, anyway.

So even though sometimes we have to do things that we don’t want to do, I challenge everyone to spend as much time as possible finding things that they are not only good at but also enjoy. Don’t choose a career and stay in it just because people tell you “hey, you’re really good at this.” And if you can’t just dump your career or switch jobs, try to spend your time outside the office doing as many things as possible that make you happy to help you make up for the hours during the day that you’re not. Because life is too long and too short to spend every day, day in and day out, grinding away at something that never makes you smile.