After a Night of Insomnia . . .

I'm feeling surprisingly alert and not at all wiped out. I could not sleep last night. Nearly got up several times to write, to blog, to do laundry even. I went to bed relatively early, sometime before 3 a.m. rolled around in the dark drumming my fingers on my forehead, making mental lists -- do the interview, write the story, email the guy, change the homepage, get the mail, return the dresses, buy the hair stuff, write something about MWW, edit the history story from GF and reply to the author, check out Joan's daughter's poems and reply to her, inquire about a dvd review and get a timeline, do the laundry, finish the lights, scrub the frying pan, go to the liquor store, find out about the site changes . . . and on and on into the morning.

It was like Sunday night anxiety in the middle of the week. It's that story that's got me so antsy. It's important. It's the reason I got the boss in trouble. I need to do a good job . . . yet interviews have been somewhat difficult so far . . . and some of my old journalist cells are still alive and kicking despite every effort of mine to squash them . . . and these cells are screaming, "This is NOT a story!"

This is an ongoing battle for me, when I try to write certain stories for bnm. They do not flow off my fingertips because I imagine Flo Siccolli or John MacCallum (was that even his name, T&I? I'm so scarred by the whole reading my lead out in front of the class as being the perfect example of how NOT to do it that I've blocked most of the experience out) rolling over in their graves . . . surely they've both died by now, he was acient then and she was permanently enshrouded in a cloud of cigarette smoke with a hacking cough that screamed throat cancer. I have no idea why I even care if they do roll over in their graves, I mean I've long since stopped labelling myself as a journalist. These non-stories that I write shouldn't bother me so much. If anything I should be happy that I don't have to stick to the rules of good journalism, that I don't have to use the inverted pyramid. I can be cute and funny and save the punch for the end if I want.

It must be the interviewing getting to me. Subjects so far have not had much to say, no great sound bites to string together. Nothing really, not a lot of input. I'm on my own, making this stuff up, reading their minds. But when it doesn't turn out like they wanted, when I haven't included the most important thing on their lists even though they failed to mention it to me, shit will hit the fan. And that's it, that's why these things are such nightmares to work on, because when there isn't any "real" story to get out of these people, I go into the interviews without a question hoping to God that they will tell me exactly what they want so I can deliver it to them . . . but they seldom do because they don't get it, that I need something from them, a bit more than what I can find on their website. Someone saying something would be helpful. And this is a problem you don't encounter with real stories, because there is a story, you know what it is, and all you have to do is ask the right questions to get them to tell it to you, easy as pie. Those stories practically write themselves.

This other kind of writing is PR in disguise and it makes me feel a little icky sometimes. Though technically if I could learn to do it well enough that's where the big bucks can be made should I ever decide to abandon this artist's salary that I've been living with and join the mega-corporation. 9-5, benefits, vacation . . . sometimes I'm tempted . . . just for a second, but heaven help me if I ever have to join the status quo, I'll go insane.

Okay, I'm off to track down a man who might have something to say other than "it's all on the website." It's gonna be great! I'm excited. What a great story I'm going to write today! These guys are gonna love it! By the time I'm done with them . . . Hey, I just thought of something . . . could this anxiety and stress have anything to do with the fact that I'm going away in a few days . . . to Alma where there will be no email and no computer and no bnm . . . Aha! Now, it makes sense. I'm doubly freaking because I've got to get all this done before the mini-break. Got it!

And she's off . . .

Mood: psyching up for another interview
Drinking: tea, King Cole, black, not bad
Listening To: U2, Elevation . . . though it's damn difficult to hear it over the racket the gardeners are making in the yard with mowers and chain saws and weed whackers . . .
Hair: it's not my imagination, it's lightening up again