DDJ – Page 3 – Deborah Makarios

February 23, 2014

Change Is In the Air

Not the largess sort, however, as pleasant as that might be. I always wondered: who first thought that flinging chunks of metal into the air over people’s heads is a good way to distribute munificence? Even lolly scrambles can be lethal if the hard-boiled element is introduced. However…

It has not escaped my attention that this coming week contains my final five days at the DDJ. And once the first spasm of Tigger impressions fades out, I’m planning a few changes (including to the blog, so keep an eye out).

To begin with, alarms. My two-alarm system has seen me jerked awake at 6:30 and 6:45 every weekday morning for – er, a long time. No more of that, thank you! In fact, I am thinking of becoming rather less of a clock-watcher all round – having a progression rather than a programme to my days.

Then a nice purgy spring clean (early autumn, but let us not quibble – it’ll be spring somewhere) which will hopefully get rid of all the dreck and detritus which has built up in the absence of suitable quantities of time and energy.

The next step is to acquire a desk. Christina Rossetti may have made do with the corner of her washstand, but, well, I’m not Christina Rossetti.

Monday writings were usually accomplished with a board over my knees, and before that I sat sideways to my rather nice little bedside table, but never yet have I had a writing desk I can sit at and get my knees under. And it has to be the right sort of desk. I may be fussy, but if I’m going to be spending hours every day with this piece of furniture, it needs to be something I at least like.

Plus it’s a brilliant excuse to go trawling through all the second-hand shops – and since I don’t have to fit everything into Saturday morning, there’s plenty of time to consider the options and not get pushed by time and tiredness into buying something that isn’t really what I wanted, but happened to be what they had.

With so many changes imminent, you might say I am turning over a new leaf.

Ahahahaha… Sorry. I won’t do it again. For at least another paragraph. Probably.

As well as a greatly increased writing output, I am also aiming to spend more time on handwork, have people over for meals more often, and even spend more time on housework and gardening.

I know, the best-laid plans of mice and men – don’t involve being eaten by cats, and yet…
Until next week (if the cats don’t get me),
Sinistra Inksteyne

January 25, 2014

Dare to Dream

What do you do when your dreams come true?

I’ve just been re-reading this post again. I wrote it over half a year ago, and yet it seems so pertinent to my present situation.
I wrote that post in a fairly rare burst of hope – and now I have received what I hoped for. As I wrote back then, “you can’t out-dream God.”

As full as my morning pages (and let’s be honest, blog posts) were of chafing against the DDJ, wishing to be freed of it and hoping to ‘one day’ be a full-time writer, I didn’t actually expect it to happen.

Not that I thought I was going to grow old and die in the DDJ, but I didn’t really think that I was going to get the chance to live my dream, either. I expected to settle for second best. Or third best. Food on the table, anyway.

Or else I thought that yes, God has a purpose for my life, but it’s probably something deeply self-sacrificial and rather unpleasant. As Julia Cameron writes, “We are not accustomed to thinking that God’s will for us and our own inner dreams can coincide.”

As much as I felt sorry for the poor historical figures who thought that God would be pleased at them seeking out suffering (and usually pointless suffering – pointy suffering seldom works to your timetable), deep down I believed the same.
I didn’t really believe that God’s will for my life could be something I’d enjoy. I underestimated God. (As J.B. Phillips wrote, Your God Is Too Small.)

This is not to say that whatever you want to do must be what God wants, too – but it doesn’t mean it can’t be.
I don’t know what God’s dream is for the rest of my life (or how long that is) – maybe I’ll always be a full-time writer, maybe I won’t. I don’t know.

What I do know is that the dream I have scarcely dared to dream for tens of years, the dream so dear I have sometimes not dared hold it close for the pain of losing it – that dream is about to come true.

And now I have to live up to it.
The problem with a dream life is that it isn’t real. You can imagine you’ll be as perfect as – well, as perfect as you can imagine. When you actually get there it turns out you are still not perfect yet and you still have to contend with all the weaknesses of character that have plagued you all along.
But you can dream of being better, and work at making that dream come true.

What do you dare to dream? And what are the dreams you don’t yet dare?

January 19, 2014

O Frabjous Day!

I would even go so far as to say Callooh, callay.

Last Friday my boss called me in for a meeting with my supervisor. (No, that isn’t the good bit. Be patient!) Having waved a long list at me of what I currently do, and a shorter list of what else they’d like me to start doing, they said that all this really came to more than four days a week, and that they would like me to go back to five days. (Definitely not the good bit.)

Can you guess what I said in reply? If you can’t, go back and have a look at the last quote post. It was like that, except my boss didn’t offer me a pay rise. I handed in my official resignation letter the next working day.
I am leaving the Dreaded Day Job! My Jabberwock is slain!

In the end, after all my dream-drafts, it didn’t actually matter whether or not I crafted the perfect resignation letter. I had other things also on my mind that weekend and the main thing was that it was done. Like organising a wedding: the main thing is that you end up married to the person you love; everything else is just icing.

Being absurdly happy at giving notice, I was prepared to be generous, and have agreed to stay on til the end of February, doing five day weeks while they train a new person. This means a notice period of seven weeks instead of the usual four, but hey, I bask in a mellow glow. Peace on earth, goodwill to all mankind etc etc.

But, I hear you ask (all right, I don’t, but indulge me here) what are you going to do now? Man does not live on bread alone, but it certainly helps! What new job have you acquired, and are you quite certain you aren’t going from the frying pan to the fire? Better the devil you know etc etc.

I thank you for your kind concern, but let me allay your fears at once. Thanks to the machinations of the Caped Gooseberry’s fruitful brain, I shall from March be taking up a full-time position as a SAHW – a stay-at-home writer.

My dream has come true.

I feel like Mary Theotokos:
“My heart overflows with my Lord’s praises,
my soul with joy because of God my Saviour
for he has not forgotten me, his servant.
Everyone will call me blessed and happy
because of what the Mighty God has done for me
– holy is His name!”

In fact, my only difficulty now is to avoid looking too happy at work – since my boss has asked me not to tell my colleagues yet, questions might well be asked which it would be difficult to answer honestly.

Happy, fortunate, lucky, blessed – oh, yes. That’s me.