Sailors and brain drain

For the past few weeks I have felt like a skimmed stone skipping over water. I have been ticking off endless daily to-do lists and being very productive, but living on the surface, constantly moving, with no time to properly live in the moment. There are lots of reasons for that - perhaps Holy-Cow-It's-October Syndrome has something to do with it? - but I'm more interested in the solutions. I've been a fan of Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way for years, but I have never been very consistent with the writing of Morning Pages (the three pages of longhand, stream-of-consciousness writing that she recommends as a daily tool). Whenever I have used them, I have found them very helpful - more as a way of staying grounded and in-the-moment than as a writing aid. I'd like to try Morning Pages again this week, though, and see if they help.

I used to keep a diary religiously (and the old ones are hilarious to re-read), but now that I write full-time and blog as well, there doesn't seem to be much of the written Andrea left at the end of the day. I suppose writing Morning Pages will be a return to keeping a journal, in some ways, but since they are written before the day starts rather than after the day has ended, they are more of a focusing tool than a personal record of events.

Although I no longer keep a diary, I do lug around a couple of blank books on a daily basis: my day planner and my notebook. These are absolutely essential if I am to live like a functional human being. My brain is a scary place. It is full of debris and space-junk: an endless procession of worries, ideas, rants and ramblings, with a jaunty 'Here be Dragons' or 'No Fishing' notice sticking out here and there. These two little books act like a drain in a particularly messy wound, keeping it clean. (Apologies for the analogy: I have been trying to think of a less disgusting one but, hey, this is the country of Black Sheep and Braindead. We can handle it.) I write absolutely everything in my day planner, no matter how small ("Clean fluff out of pockets - done!"), and it gives me a great sense of satisfaction to tick off the items at the end of the day. If something unexpected came up, I write that down too, purely for the pleasure of ticking it off.

If the day planner is where my organised, adult self lives, the notebook is for my inner two-year-old. It is full of ideas and doodles and little imaginary maps, interspersed with notes on my current project. The handwriting is nowhere near as neat in this one. It has pictures and ticket stubs and receipts tucked into the pages. Eventually it gets so fat and full that it explodes, and then it goes to live in a drawer with its other deceased relatives, and I buy a new one. I find these notebooks immensely satisfying as well.

I sometimes wonder what my notebook and my day planner say to each other when they're alone in my handbag. The day planner probably thinks the notebook is immature and frivolous, and the notebook probably thinks the day planner is stodgy and dull. They don't have much in common. I like to think that they realise they need each other, though, and are friends.