(Before I write this, I just need to put in a disclaimer for my mom because she reads these things, freaks out, and the calls me immediately, sure that I'm either on the verge of offing myself or on the edge of going postal at the post office or something, and then her worry adds to the whole pressure of everything, cause, you know, she's my mom, and I don't want to worry her.  So, Mom, chill.  I'm ok.  I just need to vent.  I'd recommend that you don't read this post. If you do, I'm gonna regret telling you about this blog!)

I'm sitting at home in a panic.  Serious panic.  I keep getting these nagging emails from the editors of this volume that I've agreed to do, (What?  It's only 2 years late, sheesh.  Can't they just Chill?)  and I'm totally panicked about this stupid freaking article.  So much so that I'm becoming paralyzed, a little paranoid, and having a bit of a wig out today. 

I realized that it is really hindering my progress on the dissertation -- I'm so worried about Getting It Right for this article, because god knows, the world is going to see it and judge it so I can't make ANY mistakes because it is the first real thing I will have published and it is going to be a pretty important volume in my field, so it must be right and perfect and not totally stupid and fucked up.  

In the face of this need for total perfection (OH, and perfection really freaking FAST!!!) I just shut down.  I spent the morning hiding in a novel and the afternoon staring at the computer in a bit of a tizzy.  It sucks.   And, the strange thing?  I kind of just want to write the freaking chapter and forget all about this article. 

But before all the well-meaning folk out there tell me to do just that, I have two important reasons for doing it, one selfish and one selfless.  

Selfless reason:  If I don't do this article, the volume won't be published.  There are an unspecified number of other historians depending on me to do it.  And they're all done, it is just down to me.  So if I fuck up, I fuck up other people, not just myself. 

Selfish reason: I don't have any publications, really, so I need this for the tenure track.  If I don't publish, I'll lose my job. 

But in a gordian knot-like situation if I don't write this article, I'll lose my job.  If I don't finish my dissertation, I'll lose my job.  But if I spend all of my time working on this article, I won't finish my dissertation, and I'll lose my job.  But if I spend all of my freaking time reading novels because it is one way of handling a crippling panic attacks, I won't finish any damned thing and I'll lose my job.  

How's that for pressure?  Shit, no wonder I'm freaked out.   

Plus, to add insult to injury this morning I sat on my glasses while on the couch reading said stupid novel, so I've been walking around all day squinting like Mr. Magoo from those old cartoons that you can probably find on YouTube because everything is on YouTube, although I prefer Hulu, myself.  

Where was I?  Oh yes, in a rant. 

So here is where I stand.  I have 23 pages of stuff that will probably work in the article with a little tinkering.  They are also the bulk of Chapter 5 and as I tinker with them, I'll still be tinkering with chapter 5.  On Saturday I wrote a rough draft of an introduction to all of this material and then spent Sunday ripping it apart.  Hence the panic, I think.  I now find myself with not much to show for a whole weekend's work.  Oh, and plus today.    ARRGHH!!! 

And, I've got all this other shit to do, right?  Class prep for the fall (I'm teaching a new freshman class) committee stuff for this group I'm working with, not to mention the hundreds of emails that people have sent me that I haven't replied to because every new email feels like the last little straw that just might kill me.  

Well, thanks for listening.  I appreciate the forum in which to vent my worst fears and to confess my deepest weaknesses.  I'm going to try to calm down and do a little work before I go get the Gadlet.  Who, incidentally, learned to sit up from a lying down position all on her own little self in the middle of the night last night.  She let out this huge cry at 3 a.m., so Spousal Unit went in to check on her and there she was sitting up in the bed!  I think she'd gotten up there by herself but couldn't figure out how to get back down.  It was adorable.  Even if it was 3 a.m.  

She's the one thing right now that isn't making me panic.  Isn't that funny, since I spent 9 months panicking about her, absolutely sure that she would bring all of this stress to my life?