On Procrastination

Here is something really funny--I created a blog last September with high hopes to write myself to clarity.  I then promptly abandoned the blog.  I thought about it a lot, but I didn't even have the common decency to put it into foster care.  Instead, I'm sure that it has just been running around in the street--playing in traffic--maybe panhandling.  I don't know, you know, whatever neglected blogs do when their namesake is Colfax  (which I might add really does get a bad rap).
 So, the thing about blogs is I don't really know who my audience is.  I think about writing ALL of the time.  Some of these writerly thoughts revolve around fictional characters, worlds, ideas, that I quickly shush because I've told myself the following things:  You don't have time to write fiction.  Your fiction--if it ever manifests itself--will be a Cervantes type of fiction, written in your retirement when you have time.  Now is for focusing on the responsibilities in front of you (specifically the ones that pay the bills).  You could never write for a paycheck because you require the structure of externally imposed deadlines, etc.  I also think about writing about revelations:  things that I have come to realize are true, but I didn't believe them or even understand them before the revelation.  I contemplate this writing with a very authoritative voice.  It is the same voice I had when I was a little kid and I pretended I had my own How To television program and would narrate my chores by explaining to my nonexistent audience with painstaking details how to make things like Kool Aid or your bed.  When I lose myself in pondering this revelation writing, I think two things:  Who gives a shit?  And, do I sound like this when I am teaching? (Oh God, please let the answer be NO).  But the final writing--the writing that actually provoked me to write a blog-- is the writing that I am compelled to do to track and publish goals.  I feel like I have been living on the edge of greatness for a long time.  And, yet--I obstruct it.  I make excuses.  And, still--I court it while always keeping it just out of reach.  Milana Kundera warns that it is dangerous to live through metaphors, so maybe I will take his advice and state my predicament more plainly.  I don't act on the things that I not only know will make me great, but also I know am capable of doing.  It really is that simple.  I know that having the life I want--the life that is almost what I have but so much better--entails a concerted realignment of my habits.  I suppose that in some Jerry Maguire way I think writing about my goals is the way to hold myself accountable for the habits of who I am.
So here is the funny thing, I know that putting things off is my biggest weakness; I created a blog to track the things I should be doing; after months of neglect, I revisit my blog only to find two entries.  The first one, I actually published, the second would-be post that has idled in limbo was titled "Procrastination".  Approximately forty minutes ago I opened the post titled "Procrastination" wondering what sagacious wisdom I might have on the topic of putting things off.  I found a blank document.  I suppose I was putting off that wisdom until, well, June 30th. 
So what are these life altering goals that I have?  In no particular order--make time to do the following things:
1.  Be present for my family to enjoy each others company and appreciate how sacred family really is.
2.  Nurture my friendships.
3.  Make exercise an integral and frequent part of my life.
4.  Keep my house clean enough. 
5.  Never, ever again get more than two weeks behind on grading.
6.  Read voraciously the way that I did before I became a teacher and a mother and had excuses not to read...
7. Write about it.