In which I have become a Raving Commitment-Phobe; and sundry other elements of a mind disturbed
I alluded, back in the fall, to certain mental asplodeys that were making me severely allergic to the least hint of entanglements, commitments, or any other Things People Might Expect Of Me. Chiefly this was presenting in the interpersonal relationship area, and you can probably fill in the blanks what that looks like. I perceive now that the tendrils have extended wraithlike into a number of other regions.
E.g.: I meant to have a housewarming upon moving to my apartment. First I didn't because it took so long to get everything squared away. Then I put it off because I didn't have curtains hung (yes, really). Then it was winter and winter is busy and everyone's so busy and and bla. Then I figured, ho, won't it be amusing to have my "housewarming" at the one-year mark? So I make a mental note to do it in April, and choose a reasonable weekend, and...
...never announce it.
I had many excuses for this; things were busy; I was working frantically on a new dress for Mudthaw (about more which later); there were career issues in play; and yet, how long does it take to bung out a Facebook announcement + copies of mail to the non-addicts? A whole 15 minutes? No, sir. That dog will not fight. Although I like my apartment and I find myself tolerably content in my day-to-day with it (these things do not always go together), I seem to have some kind of block about making a public statement of Here Am I And Here I Stand. I do not know why this would be the case...though I note that I had an anxiety dream about the place flooding and collapsing just about the time that I was renewing my lease (completely unjustified; there has never been the least problem along this line). It's also been suggested that part of it may be that I can't throw the kind of party I've been accustomed to; even when audiovile and I lived in apartments, it was never less than a 2BR, which gives a vastly different scope of possibility; and the grand productions I've become known for (if I do say so myself) are simply not possible in 285 sq. ft.
Leading thus into Contestant #2, deep and abiding frustration in my inability to be as good at $THING as I feel I should be. Comes now my new 14th c. dress, which we fit a pattern for on Feb 20th, and which I assembled mostly by myself (nedlnthred checked my fit at Nicole's on March 20th, and I bugged her with various & sundry gibbering between times); all agreed that this was a damn good design and a damn good fabric; and yet I spent all of Saturday in a state of deep discontent. I had become resigned to not finishing the closures, and thus being sewn in; that's fine; but I was wearing it with my old red underdress and a newly finished chemise, and the necklines were all completely incompatible. It is incorrect for either of the underlayers to be showing--and they both were. Moreover, the dress (or the combination of the two) was not holding me up quite as it ought, and so I had the sagging bust problem. Finally, my job of setting the sleeves in was not all that I could hope, or that I feel I should have been able to manage by this point in my work. On top of this, I had been nudged to display my green dress of the equivalent role in the A&S display, and I could not find any notes on it to comply; moreover, I realized that I lack the detailed information to document what I'm doing either with that dress or the new one. I am not re-creating a particular extant garment or a manuscript image or an entry in a wardrobe account; I'm just constructing a pattern that someone else created. Yes, it's correct--but I can't present a reasoned argument as to why that's so. And I'm professionally offended that I'm doing this. There's nothing wrong with it in the abstract--particularly with Pennsic looming, one wants to get the sweatshop a-crankin' so one is not schlumpfing around in T-tunics all day--and I would not have the least drop of opinion of someone else wearing this dress; but I expect myself to be keeping to a higher standard.
The final element of this line-item came yesterday, when Beth was instructing me on how to fix the sleeves, and I found myself getting incredibly fussy and cranky in a most ill-mannered fashion. I felt that I should know this stuff by now, and I clearly didn't; I was failing to grasp her explanation, and I hate feeling stupid (and I felt that I shouldn't be failing to grasp her explanation, as per see above, so I felt even more stupid, which I hated even more); and it took her clubbing me with the Hammer of No, This Is Advanced Tailoring, Not Sewing A Damn Seam, It's Okay To Not Know It By Osmosis for me to regain my humanity.
Like Patrick Warburton in The Dish, I am holding on too tight.
E.g.: I meant to have a housewarming upon moving to my apartment. First I didn't because it took so long to get everything squared away. Then I put it off because I didn't have curtains hung (yes, really). Then it was winter and winter is busy and everyone's so busy and and bla. Then I figured, ho, won't it be amusing to have my "housewarming" at the one-year mark? So I make a mental note to do it in April, and choose a reasonable weekend, and...
...never announce it.
I had many excuses for this; things were busy; I was working frantically on a new dress for Mudthaw (about more which later); there were career issues in play; and yet, how long does it take to bung out a Facebook announcement + copies of mail to the non-addicts? A whole 15 minutes? No, sir. That dog will not fight. Although I like my apartment and I find myself tolerably content in my day-to-day with it (these things do not always go together), I seem to have some kind of block about making a public statement of Here Am I And Here I Stand. I do not know why this would be the case...though I note that I had an anxiety dream about the place flooding and collapsing just about the time that I was renewing my lease (completely unjustified; there has never been the least problem along this line). It's also been suggested that part of it may be that I can't throw the kind of party I've been accustomed to; even when audiovile and I lived in apartments, it was never less than a 2BR, which gives a vastly different scope of possibility; and the grand productions I've become known for (if I do say so myself) are simply not possible in 285 sq. ft.
Leading thus into Contestant #2, deep and abiding frustration in my inability to be as good at $THING as I feel I should be. Comes now my new 14th c. dress, which we fit a pattern for on Feb 20th, and which I assembled mostly by myself (nedlnthred checked my fit at Nicole's on March 20th, and I bugged her with various & sundry gibbering between times); all agreed that this was a damn good design and a damn good fabric; and yet I spent all of Saturday in a state of deep discontent. I had become resigned to not finishing the closures, and thus being sewn in; that's fine; but I was wearing it with my old red underdress and a newly finished chemise, and the necklines were all completely incompatible. It is incorrect for either of the underlayers to be showing--and they both were. Moreover, the dress (or the combination of the two) was not holding me up quite as it ought, and so I had the sagging bust problem. Finally, my job of setting the sleeves in was not all that I could hope, or that I feel I should have been able to manage by this point in my work. On top of this, I had been nudged to display my green dress of the equivalent role in the A&S display, and I could not find any notes on it to comply; moreover, I realized that I lack the detailed information to document what I'm doing either with that dress or the new one. I am not re-creating a particular extant garment or a manuscript image or an entry in a wardrobe account; I'm just constructing a pattern that someone else created. Yes, it's correct--but I can't present a reasoned argument as to why that's so. And I'm professionally offended that I'm doing this. There's nothing wrong with it in the abstract--particularly with Pennsic looming, one wants to get the sweatshop a-crankin' so one is not schlumpfing around in T-tunics all day--and I would not have the least drop of opinion of someone else wearing this dress; but I expect myself to be keeping to a higher standard.
The final element of this line-item came yesterday, when Beth was instructing me on how to fix the sleeves, and I found myself getting incredibly fussy and cranky in a most ill-mannered fashion. I felt that I should know this stuff by now, and I clearly didn't; I was failing to grasp her explanation, and I hate feeling stupid (and I felt that I shouldn't be failing to grasp her explanation, as per see above, so I felt even more stupid, which I hated even more); and it took her clubbing me with the Hammer of No, This Is Advanced Tailoring, Not Sewing A Damn Seam, It's Okay To Not Know It By Osmosis for me to regain my humanity.
Like Patrick Warburton in The Dish, I am holding on too tight.