Out of Step

I was raking leaves yesterday. Our fall leaf pickup was a month ago. That’s when I put out the apricot leaves—but my oak trees don’t pay attention to timetables. They are out of step.

Along with my oaks, I too have felt out of step, especially during these last few months. 

I lunched with a friend a couple days ago and told her how I spent my time escaping into DVDs and books—and she was totally supportive. But it would have been much better if I too had thought what I was doing was great, rather than sitting in judgment on my inability to write. I’m only now admitting that the events of the last two years have created a burnout of my creative juices.

So, being out of step, I want to figure out how to get back into step with myself. It turns out, I have already begun.

For years, I’ve operated on the principle that New Year’s Eve is a good time to bring some projects to a close. And it is also a good time to begin a new project before the start of the new year.

Akin to the job of raking leaves is the clearing out of old paper and epaper: years of Christmas cards; emails; filing cabinets of ephemera; journals . . .

The journals alone will take a long time—years, really. But I might succeed with some sorting tasks. For instance, my filing cabinets might be reorganized within the next twelve months.

This reorganizing challenge  will eventually be interrupted when the copyedits of Quantum Quest return to me, to be followed by preparing the book for publication and promotion. For that I’ll need all the creative energy I can muster.

So here’s my resolution for 2026. I will seek to regain my footing by sorting, discarding, reorganizing old matters. Hopefully, my outlook will then be ready for new challenges. And now back to raking leaves. 

Let me wish you all a Productive New Year.

Where would you like to begin?