A Light at the End of the Tunnel

I want this lamp.

It's called Colgao (the hanged man) and it was made by a Spanish art collective called enPieza! I believe it's one of a kind, so the likelihood of anyone getting it for me for my birthday is small. But you never know.

I think this is the perfect lamp for a writer to have on his desk. Well, for this writer to have on his desk. I love the gallows humor of it. (Ha ha! See what I did there!) But I also know how the little fellow feels. There he is, strangling, even as his head lights up with new ideas. He's probably thinking, "This would make a great ending to chapter seventeen."

I feel as if I'm strangling a bit this week. For the past six months I've been working on three different novels. They all come out next year, and they're all on similar schedules, but I managed to space them out so that they wouldn't pile up.

Only this week, like some once-in-a-lifetime convergence of the planets, they're lined up one behind the other. I'm finishing up the manuscript for one, doing rewrites on another, and going over copyedits for the third. Oh, and I'm working up the outline for the next book.

I'm not complaining, mind you. I'm excited about all three books, and it's great to see them all nearing completion. I just wish they hadn't all landed on my desk at the same time. Because instead of working through them in a logical manner I sit here staring at them, doing nothing and hoping that maybe I can use ESP to get them to write themselves.

It doesn't help that Horrible Spider has been all ADD lately too. I think I mentioned that when he molted earlier this year he emerged all grown up and ready to mate. Well, he's been insane ever since. Where before he spent almost all of his time in his log, now he paces the terrarium. We're talking around and around and around. All day long. Although I don't want to saddle him with assumptions about his romantic leanings, I assume he's looking for a girl tarantula. I've tried finding him one, but apparently there are no mature female Guyana Pinktoes in the Bay area. If any of you have one, call me.

Horrible's terrarium is on the desk, to the right of the monitor, so all day I watch him doing his tornado imitation. Every 90 seconds or so he passes by and waves. Then he's off again, like he's the lead car in the Tarantula 500. I suspect he sees me sitting there every time he passes by and thinks, "Doesn't he ever do anything?"

I am doing something. Unlike him, though, my mania is all in my head. My body sits still, but my mind is spinning like an out of control top. Like Horrible Spider it occasionally waves to me and calls out "hello!" as it speeds by, but mostly it goes around and around and around on a fruitless search for, well, something.

Last Sunday I made a list of everything I needed to get done this week. Now it's Friday and I've crossed off exactly one thing ("write Friday's blog entry"). Everything left will just have to get added to next week's list. The funny thing is, I'm almost out of this tunnel I've been in for months. If I'd just stuck to my schedule I would be done with all three of my projects by now. But noooooooo. I had to go and, well, not be done with them.

I bet if I had the Colgao lamp I would be. I bet if I had it I would sit down every day, turn it on, and be filled with creative light. Also, I bet Horrible would enjoy it. The two of us could sit perfectly still, bathed in its lovely glow and thinking happy thoughts.

Or not. But I still want it.