Monday 18 December 2023
“If you’re going to finish the Katyn manuscript by July 15, 2023, you need to make some sacrifices. You need more time to write,” I insisted to myself. Once the Spring 2023 semester of teaching was over, I committed myself to finishing the manuscript. The previous year, I demanded of myself that I finish by Christmas 2022; however, coming down with Covid during July 2022 nixed that ambition. Everything halted. Recovering slowly (agh, how impatient and annoyed Daniel the patient was!) from Covid, I realized that any setback could derail me for months, preventing all attempts to write. I couldn’t will myself to write through the Covid setback.
Once my health regained some improvement, another setback impeded me: I barely walked down the block with my dog, Laska. If I couldn’t simply walk the dog, how then was I to finish a 600-plus page manuscript by Christmas 2022? The resentment didn’t choke me. It didn’t cause resignation or writer’s block. In fact, it did the opposite. That indignation fueled my drive to reach a new target: July 15, 2023. It forced me to be more vigilant with my health, physically and mentally. That new date became an all-consuming mantra, which I repeated hourly.
In my mind, I had the vision of a complete manuscript. I had the intellectual vigor to complete the manuscript. I had the creative energy powering that vision and vigor. I now reached the milestone in the writing process where I was incensed with myself for not having a complete manuscript. Outrage sometimes can be a stimulant or stoppage for a writer to finish; it spurred me to finish. However, did I have the physical stamina to finish the manuscript? I became even more obsessive with my health: exercising more, eating more vegetables and vitamin supplements to protect myself from another illness. I was angry that my goal of December 2022 slipped through my hands. An unfair condemnation, but guilt is funny that way: you blame yourself for doing something, blame yourself for not doing something, and blame yourself for something totally out of your control.
In March 2023, I reconfirmed the date of July 15 as my due date for a complete manuscript. I reviewed my notes, reorganized my bookshelves, and resolved myself. I reassessed what I needed to write. And then I started writing. The Pomodoro Technique helped; however, my unconscious spoke to me: “you need more time to write. Writing for 120 minutes wasn’t enough.” The critical insight echoed in my mind. My unconscious was right. In roughly 16 weeks, July 15 would arrive. July 15 seemed like plenty of time and yet it wasn’t. The task of completing the Katyn manuscript by July 15 necessitated the same uncompromising (even maniacal) devotion to the act of writing as I had demonstrated while writing my dissertation on Melville.
During the composition of the Melville book, I would write everywhere, anytime. I would write in a parked car, on a park bench, in the bathroom—anyplace where I could find isolation and quiet. When an idea struck me while walking across campus, I wrote it on a scrap of paper; by the end of the week, I had a small mountain of scrappy insights ready to be transformed into paragraphs, chapters. Moreover, after putting Ethan—who was 3, 4 years old at the time—to bed, I would sleep for an hour, wake up, drink coffee, and write throughout the night—usually until 5 A.M. Sleep for 2 hours, wake up, take Ethan to daycare, and drive to campus to teach. And write. Repeat the process. I was a younger man when I executed that unwavering and slightly maniacal schedule. Coffee and music rejuvenated both body and soul. The excitement of discovering a new insight reignited the creative engines and kept them humming. Oh, to be younger again!
That young man who now became the current Katyn book writer no longer has that kind of writerly stamina. The new older-self goes to bed by 10:00 P.M; staying up later than 11 P.M. rarely happens. He is a father of two older children. He has a dog. He has a house, not a coop apartment. I would be a fool to say I only need to learn how to protect time better to hold onto it. Life now is more complicated. Strategies to write also must become more nuanced and adaptive. Negotiations with my schedule and responsibilities are elaborate, and they are susceptible to sudden, unforeseen alterations. My attitude must be flexible; I cannot insist on this way or that way because I would invite writer’s block to return.
Postponing a hobby, declining an invitation, or neglecting a commitment temporarily isn’t necessarily a devastating or permanent terminus; it’s a setback, but one that I can easily regain if that asceticism doesn’t involve sacrificing a loved one. Nevertheless, self-denial requires something of high value for it to be meaningful and fruitful. Forbidding myself chocolate during Lent isn’t so arduous. The pain of not having chocolate for forty days isn’t consequential enough for the supposed spiritual benefit. To finish the Katyn book, I needed to give up something more significant.
The nineteenth century American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson taught me to be mindful of the cost, or should I say damage, of sacrificing one thing for something else. In “Compensation,” he writes, “if I gain any good, I must pay for it; if I lose any good, I gain some other.” I always understood Emerson here as saying: for every gain, there is a loss. I always interpreted, rightly or wrongly, Emerson’s lesson as a warning against, not a celebration of progress. And my recurring existential question is: “What am I gaining by losing X, or what am I losing by gaining Y?” The question’s answer is frightening. The answer may not be what I want it to be.
Nonetheless, the time leading up to July 15, 2023 continued ticking on. If I were to reach that date successfully, I needed to sacrifice something. I needed to give up something so that I could finish (finally) the Katyn manuscript. The only part of my life I was willing to let go was my daily exercise routine. Shelving my conditioning was a risky gamble because I needed to protect my health, not compromise it; nonetheless, not exercising freed up a lot of time. I wrote more, but my guilty conscience stung me. It pestered me, asking, “What would Emerson think?” My inner voice often sounds like Emerson scolding me.
All the same, Emerson’s warning turned out to be half true, or so it seemed. I gained a complete manuscript. The loss? I’m not sure what that forfeiture was. And I’m not being insolent. My health didn’t deteriorate; however, it could have. I didn’t sacrifice family time; in fact, we went on vacation in June. As Ania reminded me, walking our dog, Laska, is exercise: 10,000 steps worth of exercise. My saving grace.
On the other hand, I did lose the fear and anxiety of writing this Katyn book that plagued me for years. By adjusting writing techniques—even breaking some rules of writing—should be considered as gains but also ironic losses. I lost those self-limiting and self-imposed obstructions. Moreover, to (re-)gain my confidence, I had to lose myself. Perhaps, this final insight is what Emerson meant.
I am still unconvinced about whether I indeed lost something while giving up exercise to finish the manuscript. Emerson hasn’t yet persuaded me I did or didn’t lose something or must pay for it somehow. Despite that obscurity, Emerson still suggests to me that what I may not immediately see is that there is something lurking beneath the surface of my new gain. And that something bothers me; my unconscious mumbles something, but I fail to understand it. Likely, I am not ready for the revelation to unveil itself.
I’m glad you were able to power through
thanks!