Author: Jackie Pick

Jackie Pick is a former teacher and current writer living in the Chicago area. She is a contributing author to multiple anthologies, including Multiples Illuminated, So Glad They Told Me: Women Get Real about Motherhood, Here in the Middle, as well as the and the literary magazines The Sun and Selfish. She received Honorable Mention from the Mark Twain House and Museum for her entry in the Royal Nonesuch Humor Writing Competition. Jackie is a contributing writer at Humor Outcasts, and her essays have been featured on various online sites including McSweeney's, Belladonna Comedy, Mamalode, The HerStories Project, and Scary Mommy. A graduate of the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, Jackie is co-creator and co-writer of the award-winning short film Fixed Up, and a proud member of the 2017 Chicago cast of Listen To Your Mother.

Exhaustion. Day 29.5 of 100 Days of Writing

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I haven’t slept, gone to the bathroom alone, or finished a thought in the last 48 hours. I’m flying solo with the three kids this week, as mentioned yesterday. After a good start, the reality of it all hit last night at about 10 (after a sleepless night on Saturday), and the kids were up at various times throughout the night. At 5, when I jumped out of bed to get writing and/or laundry done, Baby Girl decided it was nice and sunny out…time to get up!

And my day started. And it’s been long.

So I need to be gentle with myself. My brain hurts. My body hurts. I am chaperoning a field trip tomorrow. The debate in my mind is “Can I do anything of merit tonight after the kids go down and I’ve been up this long? Am I chickening out?”

This is where I feel useless and tired…

This is where I am envious of people who have the moments and the energy and the sleep.  I have the motivation. I am feeling like a failure at this. Where is the breakthrough? Where is the awesomeness?

Where is the moment where I prove something to myself other than that I can be very meta about writing a bunch of drafts?

And yes, I’ll write tonight. But I’m not counting it towards my 100 days. I’m pretty sure it’ll be a hard and fast 30 minutes.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow…

Send coffee.