"Writer's Logjam" - Worse than a "block" in many ways

I have a case of "Writer's logjam." At first, I thought I was lucky and clever enough to coin the term on my own, but I guess it's no surprise that at least one person has used the term and gives a pretty good description of what I'm dealing with at the moment:

This is really interesting because here, a person doesn't have enough ideas, they have way too many.

They start on one, go to another, and another, nothing gets ever finished and all those unfinished projects pile up and cause a logjam - and nothing moves at all any longer.

Not knowing that this is so, writers will DESPERATELY try to get MORE AND MORE ideas, thinking they've run out, and that makes the logjam ever worse until not a trickle gets through the dam any longer and we really have now absolute writer's block.

The solution for this is to take any one of THE OLD PROJECTS at the base of the logjam and to FINISH IT.

Obviously, I'm writing here, so you might be thinking "what's the big deal?"

The big deal is that I should be writing something on the other blog - the one I do as part of my job.

But I have a problem. Last week included disrupted sleep patterns and time off so I could catch up with housework left undone while returning from the trip to Connecticut. Monday involved more disrupted sleep and then a sick day yesterday.

In the course of a week, at least four big things have come up related to my NDY work. I am full of ideas about how to write about each and every one of them. They are all important. And they are all currently tangled up in my head as I try to sort them out and figure out where to even start. And, of course, if I don't write anything today, my dilemma will be even worse tomorrow.

It suddenly occurred to me that one way to get something accomplished was to write about the current struggle here on this blog. That way, at least I'm writing again and not just obsessing about what I'm not writing.

The best case scenario is that this will somehow unstick my mental gears (alert: switching metaphors here) and I can get started on my other tasks.

The worst case scenario is that whatever I write here will be all I write today. But at least that will be better than the alternative.

This is far from the first time I've been in this situation. I know it won't be the last.

If anyone has any ideas for getting through these logjams (alert: back to original metaphor), I'd be open to hearing them.

I still have an hour or two left in the day. Maybe I can do better than just stare at the screen - I know that would make tomorrow easier. --Stephen

Back from the road and glad to be home

The trip to Connecticut went well, but the driving was a major challenge.

OK, back up a minute. I don't want to overstate the case. I can still drive safely and well on a highway in the daylight. I have the necessary concentration, reflexes and attention-shifting to drive (and all the associated motor tasks in operating a vehicle), but I don't seem to have a lot left over. Once in awhile, I'll sneak a sip of iced tea from the travel cup in the holder - it has the top kept open - but that's about all I'll dare in terms of extraneous activity.

Still, it didn't seem that hard while I was doing it.

At night, my body told me a different story.

Most of the time when I am in a hotel or motel, I am restless and don't sleep all that well, especially if I am keyed up about speaking.

This time was different. After 7 hours on the road getting to our destination, I pretty much fell asleep very soon after my head hit the pillow. I struggled to get up after a full seven hours of sleep.

We drove part way home on Friday. I spent about four hours on the road (total times always include breaks). Pulled off the road around 5 pm at the Herkimer Motel & Suites in Herkimer, NY. I am naming the motel and providing a links because I recommend it highly. It's well-kept up, has helpful staff and has one of the best wheelchair-accessible rooms we've stayed in. If the opportunity arises, I'd gladly stay there again.

We went to bed early that night. I got a wake-up call and went to turn the heat up. I figured I would wake up again in about 20-30 minutes when it got too warm.

I slept for an additional 90 minutes. That means I slept between 8.5 and 9 hours. That is very very unusual for me. My body is usually satisfied with seven hours and maybe a few minutes more.

The only explanation I have for this is that the driving really really exhausted me. Strange, though, because I didn't really feel that exhausted. But my sleep pattern tells a different story.

It's just one more thing to factor in from now on. Looks like if I have to drive for a long distance, I better build in some extra sleep time.

OTOH, as you might gather from this blog post, the trip didn't throw me too far off my work rhythm.

This is a good thing. I have lots on my plate these days and really don't need to be falling behind more. --Stephen

On the road again...

*Sigh* Time for another road trip.

Diane and I are giving a presentation in Connecticut on Friday. Theoretically, it's a five-and-a-half hour drive or so.

I'm guessing it will be closer to seven hours. I need to take breaks when I drive.

Also, even though we're finishing up around 1 pm on Friday, we won't get home until Saturday.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned it here, but I've ceased highway driving in the dark (except for short trips close to home when necessary). It just takes too much effort.

So hopefully I'll get us to Albany by dark on Friday and we can get home around noon on Saturday.

Just so no one misunderstands me - I am looking forward to meeting with some of the people that will be attending and the opportunity to do some organizing work.

OTOH - I really loathe long-distance driving. I don't like having the rhythm of my life get disrupted - it can take too long to get it back.

I can't complain really. This means that there are people who feel that I have information and insights on disability policy issues worth hearing firsthand. And NDY needs more people in the disability community more attuned to the intricacies of the assisted suicide/euthanasia debates.

In a perfect world, I'd be able to do advocacy without ever leaving my home or office.

I don't live in that world, however. So I'm going to Connecticut. :-) --Stephen Drake

I'm getting too old for this

If I haven't spelled this out before, I have to pay a lot more attention to what my body is doing than most people do. That includes major things like driving, minor things like scooping coffee into the filter in the coffee maker, and potentially disastrous things like walking down the stairs.

When it comes to our basement stairs, I have rules. I go slow. I watch my feet. I have at least one hand free to hold the railing. I pay attention to the act of going walking up or down the stairs and try not to get distracted.

Sunday night, I broke all the rules. We had a minor plumbing disaster - turns out the garbage disposal was loose, which vibrated the heck out of the PVC sink pipes. The sink pipes came apart in two places. Water everywhere.

First, I cleaned up that water on the kitchen floor. Then I called our plumber friend who said he could come out the next day. After that, I went to clear out the cupboard under the sink.

I had the bright idea to put some of the stuff from under the sink on the wall shelf on the cellar stairs. I gathered up a bunch of stuff in both hands and started down the stairs. I made it about four steps down when my feet went out from under me and I slid down - hard - for a few steps. My sneakers were wet and the steps are bare wood - bad combination.

Oddly enough I didn't drop anything. I did bang my left ankle and skinned both my elbows. After setting things on the shelf, I went back up and washed my elbows. They were sore.

I was a little leery of the stairs after that, so I found a box and filled it with the rest of the stuff in the cupboard and stuck it in the back bedroom.

As the evening progressed, I became aware of more aches and pains - took some aspirin and a muscle relaxant and went to bed.

The next morning, my left elbow was causing me lots of trouble. As long as my arm was extended, it wasn't too much of a problem. But the more my arm flexed, the greater the pain - to the point where blowing my nose with two hands was almost impossible. After a great deal of research during the day, I decided the likeliest thing was that the injury had resulted in olecranon bursitis.

You can read the description if you're interested, but it explained the pain and swelling. And I changed the treatment from aspirin to alleve. The elbow started to improve and I can blow my nose again. :-)

So - within the next week or two, I'll be getting some kind of non-slip material for the cellar stairs. And I'll probably be better at following my rules.

The thing is, no is perfect in adhering to a routine or set of rules - me included. Stuff like this happened to me when I was in my twenties and thirties, but I was a lot more flexible then.

It hurts a lot more now. Gotta start getting serious about "Stephen-proofing" the house. --Stephen

Unexpectedly Long Hiatus - Expansions and Contractions of Life

I am mortified that I neglected this blog for so long. My apologies to anyone who had developed an interest in it.

I wish I could promise it won't happen again, but it might, because this blog is one of those "add-ons" in my life - meaning I do it when I have the time, energy, and concentration to write on it after having met the core obligations of my life - family and job, mostly.

The trouble is, I get into really (and uncharacteristically) highly productive periods. I take new things into an already crowded life and manage it all joyfully for awhile - sometimes a long while. Then something gives and I have to retreat to managing my core obligations until I am ready to start expanding my workload again.

It's no easy feat. For one thing, there's the "executive dysfunction" to deal with. Many of us who fall outside of the neurotypical range have trouble managing the minutiae of everyday tasks and obligations - I'm no exception. Rather than going into a long treatise on what that means, I'll share the following song that I originally discovered when my friends at the Turner & Kowalski blog posted it:



So does every line of this song apply to me? No, but it's definitely familiar territory. Periodically, the juggling of the absolute essentials can pretty much occupy all my time and energy.

In the months since I last wrote, we took a nice vacation at home with Diane's (my partner) sister and niece. I've only had to travel out of town once - for which I am very grateful. We've had to deal with Diane coming down with the Swine Flu and get sicker than she's been in maybe 20 years - but we got through that.

We also have a new member of the household. He's a three-legged 11-year-old cat named "Oliver." Long story. If you're on Facebook, you can join his fan page here.

That's all for now. At the very least, I'll try to post some links to some good stuff I've come across over the past few months that are relevant to the topics this blog is supposed to cover. --Stephen

Autube: A conversation with Stephen Drake

Well, if anyone is curious as to what the voice behind the typing sounds like, I am up live on a podcast on Autube.

Autube, funded by the Dan Marino Foundation, is "an issues-driven web channel enabling exchange of ideas for people with autism." The site is designed and operated by Kent Creative. The podcast is an edited version of an interview of me that was conducted by Jon Kent, president of Kent Creative.

A few words about the interview:

• My intonation is uneven and my speech hesitations worse than usual - a result of doing the interview while imitrex and a migraine battling it out in my skull.
• There are a couple of places where I laugh (kind of) and it might seem weird. In at least one of those places - talking about "aversives" - it was more of a nervous "tic" talking about something I hate looking back at, but feel I have a duty to do just that.
• A lot of specific information about media coverage and advocacy groups was edited out of the interview. This is understandable but regrettable. Hence, the quote from a leader of a Canadian "right to die" group equating the length of a girl with cerebral palsy's life with a prison sentence is mentioned. Also missing is a lengthy discussion of the coverage of Katie McCarron's murder - and the role that specific advocacy groups played in promoting a "blame the victim" theme in coverage of her death.
• Finally, this is in audio only. The site is a new one and they are working at providing print transcripts of podcasts.

So, for anyone who is interested, here is a discussion of some of my journey through life and the advocacy work I do now:

A conversation with Stephen Drake (mp3 format)

That's all for now. --Stephen

Minefields, stumbling and explosions

Well, I made it through the conference. But, as the title suggests, I didn't do it without managing to set off a few "mines" of the social variety.

Some of it was unintentional. At a preconference meeting, I have it on good authority that at least one of my contributions came off as interrupting, slightly off-topic and maybe rude. That's me when I'm trying to behave.

I've written a long account of the major events that sparked some explosions in the NDY blog. Here's an excerpt describing a key event I want to discuss here:

For me, things came to a head on the first day when a representative of the LaRouchePAC stepped up to the audience question-and-answer microphone. He read a piece of crap he called “research” that labeled Obama’s health care plan (what we know so far) as a “Nazi plan.” To my disgust and horror, over half the audience broke out into applause over that.

(Note: Below, "Alex" refers to Alex Schadenberg, who is the E.D. of the Canadian-based Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, which organized the conference.)
I took Alex aside and told him that he had no idea what just happened and how bad it was. The LaRouchePAC is one of several entities attached to Lyndon LaRouche, conspiracy enthusiast. Pretty much no one of any political stripe who wants to be taken seriously becomes associated with the man or his group. (BTW, the guy from the PAC got in for free with a “media pass” – probably from his home printer, and then did the un-journalistic move of leaving promotional materials. He also didn’t ask any questions. Maybe this gives you an idea of the ethics – or lack thereof – in how they operate.)

Alex let me take the podium in response. I can’t remember everything I said, or the argument I had with the guy from the PAC. But I knew it wouldn’t be enough, especially with repeated exposure to material that had nothing to do with euthanasia and assisted suicide.

There are a few things I should share here about what went on within my brain and body during this short span.

I don't get panic attacks, but my body can do a good imitation of one in high-stress situations. When I know I am heading into a high-stress situation, I take a beta blocker in advance. That medication dampens the bodies response to stress hormones and adrenalin.

Stupidly, I had not taken one that day.

So, when I went up to Alex, I did so knowing I was risking a full-scale physiological rebellion. In fact, when talking to him and when I went up to the podium, my legs were shaking badly and I was having trouble controlling my breath. Fortunately, it didn't escalate into facial contortions and even worse problems with breathing. I may have looked enraged rather than alarmed and pissed, but I looked in control.

And it was necessary - letting it go would have signalled acceptance or approval, making the work ahead much more difficult. That includes damage control.

As you can read on the NDY blog, I followed up with more of the same the next day, this time with a body becalmed with a beta blocker.

As you might imagine, some in my audience - justifiably - heard what I had to say as a criticism or even attack on them. This is seldom done in the context of a "coalition."

Thing is, I am more likely to go there than most. I understand the power that group dynamics play in the lives of people. I understand a lot of it intellectually. But I don't feel the pull - emotionally - to maintain the appearance of unity, cohesion and solidarity at any cost.

On the one hand, it leaves me freer to see when it's appropriate to break from the group. OTOH, it means I am vulnerable to underestimating the cost of breaking those norms.

Fortunately, I have someone who "gets" those dynamics in a more conventional way. When I lay my case out and Diane says she agrees, then it's always been a good move - or - to be honest - the least bad one.

S'all for now. Gotta go on another longer drive tomorrow. Be back Sunday night and hopefully posting again next week. --Stephen