Writing is a job. I will say it again. Writing is a job. It should be treated as such. Because (for many) it does not require actually going into work, sitting in a cubicle, and punching a time clock, it is easily relegated to filling the space between all the other things that need to get done.
It's a strange thing to do and I am still not used to it. Last night, in a conversation with a woman who goes into work at a 9 - 5 job, we got to talking about my commitments. I told her that I was still finishing up my course papers. She said, "Oh, you're unemployed?" No. I am not unemployed. Just as I would not characterize a mother as unemployed, I do not consider myself as such.
As the G20 organizing is getting more and more demanding, and my deadlines are fast approaching (with a 25-30 page paper still unwritten), I am finding it harder and harder to say no to this or that meeting or 'bottom lining' this or that task. And while folks are sympathetic to my demands, in a meeting, when others are literally organizing 60 hours a week, it becomes easy to look at the gal who wasn't at the two or three other meetings that day and ask, "why can't you take this on?" But I have to keep telling myself that my commitments outside this space are important and worth treating as a job.
It will be my mantra. This is a job, this is a job, this is a job....
And here's where the insecurities creep in (c'mon, you knew they had to be in there somewhere). Again, I just don't understand why it takes some folks so little time to write a paper. It seems to take me forever and a day. And I feel like these papers are really really mediocre. Like, if I were to invite those I am working with to read what I've ignore 'the movement' for, they'd be like, "it took you all that time to write this?"
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