Habitat Forge

According to Habitforge.com, it takes only 21 days to form a habit. So I thought daily blogging might be a worthwhile endeavor. I like the idea of forging behavior -- forging always makes me think of Pigeon Forge, NC, which in turn makes me think of Dolly Parton, a paragon of bootstrapping. Maybe I can successfully form a habit in only a day. After all, that's how long it took me to get hooked on Bacon Ranch Pringles (which are actually Kosher?)

While not writing, I've spent some quality time teaching, and rearranging furniture, and discussing Spartacus Blood and Sand with Dan, and looking up Western birds in a bird book, and figuring out why I take extended hiatuses from writing. I even went to a few sessions of sliding scale therapy to address my tendencies towards procrastination and self-doubt. My therapist works with children, so sometimes I asked to play with her multicultural puppet set. I can now also beat the steel-ball-in-a-hole skill game.

I think that by relinquishing rigid ideas of perfection, I will be more productive. Last night I had a dream that I caught a brightly colored fish, and when I attempted to unhook it, it transmogrified into a white-faced ibis (I know this from my book of Western birds). The white-faced ibis has red eye in every picture and a beak reminiscent of Edward Scissor Hands and is known to ornithologists as a "wanderer." Basically, it can't commit to a habitat.



In my dream, I reached out to my flighty ibis, but she made a squawking sound and zig-zagged away. Then I was rehearsing with the cast of Glee. The point is, there's some connection between habit and habitat. Repetition is a form of root-taking. I suspect that creative freedom isn't about spreading my wings, but standing still.