Someday Soon
Caring for Your Wild and Terrible Enthusiasms
Someday I’m going to write a book called “Someday I’m going to….”
It seems the older you get, the more time has a way of getting away from us. The fragments slip from our grasp like a tiny ejector spring leaping into the shag carpet of life. One minute you’re ahead of the curve, the next thing you know, there is no way to catch up with your schedule unless you figure out a way to bend the time-space continuum.
I’ve realized a big part of my problem is distractions. It’s pretty obvious I wholly fall under the influence of what writer Patrick F. McManus called “wild and terrible enthusiasms.” Let me illustrate.
A Day in the Life
At this very moment, I’ve got another issue of the magazine due, plus Crossfire for previous month and this Insider column. At the same time, I’m working on the GUNS Magazine Podcast, a new Gun Cranks episode, plus I have two feature-length stories due for an advertising supplement. This goes on top of the normal crush of email, phone calls, generalized planning and daily brushfires.
I’m not whining or seeking any sympathy as this is the normal pace of being a magazine editor. It goes with the job but I wanted to demonstrate I don’t have much spare time at the moment. In such a situation, a rational and mature magazine editor would undoubtedly put his phone on “silent,” shut off the email and get down to business, right? Yes, unless he falls prey to the aforementioned Enthusiasms.
In my case, instead of tackling important work matters, I instead found myself unboxing a new electric hunting/adventure bicycle I’m going to review. It might have sat quietly in the big box in my garage for years if necessary but I couldn’t resist the siren song of the long-awaited two-wheeler. I justified the time it took to assemble the electric monster by thinking, “this is for GUNS, therefore it’s actual work.” And, just like that, two hours lost.
I didn’t have any handy rationalizations when next I organized my backpack for a hiking trip this weekend. This cost me another hour, but we’re running out of time so it was necessary to move this task up the list — another 60 minutes gone.
Shortly afterward we had a scheduled online video meeting. During 90 minutes our team accomplished exactly 10 minutes of actual work and 80 minutes of gossip, snark and semi-dirty jokes. I figure this is about average for most businesses.
We’re now up to noon and lunch break, wherein I tackled a personal project working on the computer-synchronized holiday lights I plan on hanging this season. These are the ones you often see on YouTube, gaudily dancing and frolicking to music while aggravating the nearest neighbors. You won’t be surprised to learn these systems require a lot of planning, effort and equipment, a perfect project for people who cannot sit still for long periods of time. Another couple of hours slipped away.
Once lunch had finished, I needed to check email and found several which weren’t really time-critical but piqued my interest. There was a back-and-forth exchange about an upcoming story on the M231 Firing Port Weapon. After reading another email regarding the S&W Model 629, I had to research the matter, because, well, I hadn’t thought about the 629 in a while. Poof, two more hours down the drain.
Finally settling back to the increasingly urgent work, I looked up to see my daily carry pistol sitting on the desk sans holster. This reminded me I had used the holster late yesterday to check the fit with a new pack.
While retrieving the holster I wondered about options for carriage of spare magazines. This naturally led to a search of my gun safe for a couple more mags to test out the possibilities. I tried a few things but also wondered if another pack or bag would work better. A quick trip to the back closet — where all the B-string bags live in solitary confinement — provided several possibilities. I tried each of these, weighing the various angles, flaps, buckles and positions for the best option but reached no major conclusion.
Then, as I was putting the test magazines away, I had to give a momentary fondle to several guns I hadn’t seen in a while. This shouldn’t count against me as I believe it’s completely reasonable to spend a few moments making baby talk to some of your favorite safe queens.
And there went another pair of hours.
By now I was ready to get down to business, at least until I saw my camera gear was a mess. Knowing photo equipment left lounging around is subject to all kinds of heinous damage, I made sure to get everything secured cleaned up and stowed in the appropriate storage areas.
But first, I had to look at the photos on the camera to “edit” but mainly to relive the trip they document. Then, as I put everything away, the dinner bell rang. I’ve learned the hard way my beloved wife gets upset if I don’t eat the food while it is still hot, so work got another postponement.
After a wonderful spaghetti dinner I promptly fell asleep in my recliner while watching gun videos on YouTube. Waking an hour later in a carbohydrate fog, responsibility hit me squarely in the face so I put my dishes in the sink and headed back to the office.
Taking my seat at the desk, I had a sudden realization. It was late and I was exhausted from all the effort of the day so obviously it made sense to wait until tomorrow before tackling work. Now mentally unburdened, I used the remaining free time to watch some fishing videos before bedtime.
It Happened Again
As I lay in bed mentally rewinding the day, I suddenly realized my passions had once again gotten in the way of actual work. It doesn’t take a PhD in psychology to see I possess the attention-span of a bird-dog puppy, ready to chase the next grasshopper or fluttering leaf. Along comes an Enthusiasm and I’m off and running.
Aside from shooting and hunting, fishing is another major interest which has cost countless days of my life and a not-inconsiderable amount of money, both of which could have been applied toward my job. I sometimes wonder how much more I could have accomplished if I wasn’t so busy chasing cold-blooded animals with a brain smaller than almost any of the Kardashians.
Then, there’s hiking. And backpacking, for good measure. To the list you should certainly add boating, gardening, trapping, home improvement, kayaking, camping, frog gigging, fossil collecting, spelunking, music, exploring, scuba diving, wildlife photography, biking, pipe smoking and travel. Fortunately, hunting doesn’t take up much time because I only hunt deer, elk, small game, upland game, mushrooms, turkey, imported exotics and soon, mountain lion — nothing much really.
All of these things, at various times and stages of my life, have been or continue to be passions which inflame my gusto and arouse my zeal.
The whole thing is a big pain in the neck — have you ever walked around in public with an aroused zeal? It’s pretty embarrassing, and even worse when your gusto is fully engorged.
Taking The Cure
It’s pretty clear I need to get my enthusiasms under control. So, going forward I hereby resolve to spend my time more wisely and purposefully while ignoring the beck and call of momentary obsessions. This will allow me to focus more fully on shooting and writing, investigating the topics and guns I still want to explore during my time as Head Poohbah of GUNS. This means I’ll have time to really handcraft stories of lasting significance, share words of wisdom, ideas of depth and create inspirational writing for the ages.
In fact, maybe I’ll have time to finally achieve one of my most aspirational goals — someday, I’ll finally write a really good Insider column.
But first I need to mess around with my reloading press. After all, those .45 Colt shells aren’t going to load themselves.
