Kelly Loves Being Someone Else for a Day

This is a kumquat. You'll understand later.

Today I did something interesting and odd: I got to be someone else entirely for a whole hour. This was a particularly good day for me to have this opportunity, for from the moment I woke up I had no interest whatsoever in being myself. Myself, Kelly, is someone who is supposed to be writing a book. And writing a book was the last thing I wanted to do this morning. I have been in a spiral of self-doubt since yesterday, when the client for whom I am writing said book gave me feedback on the two chapters I had just finished. I heard none of the good stuff and all of the bad, and suddenly I was:

1) Hopeless at this writing thing

2) A total fake who cranks out material rather than letting it be downloaded through her by God

3) Never going to make her deadline.

I called it quits after the call yesterday, expecting to get up on the right side of bed this morning. But instead of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, I was sullen, negative, and self-hating. Welcome to the wonderful world of writing!

So when I remembered that today is the day I got to play Amanda for the psychological diagnosis grad school class my friend teaches, I perked up.

This is the second year in a row I've been the "final exam" in Cheryl's class. Always the actress, I volunteered as soon as I heard she needed someone to come into the class play a patient. I would study a description of "Amanda," and then they would diagnose me.

Last year I was nervous, but this year I had Amanda down. She's an architect, living in Denver for six months, and she's falling apart at the seams. She's scared about nothing! Scared to be here alone, without her loving husband Carlo. Usually she can keep things together but now....

Anyway, on the off-chance one of Cheryl's students is reading this blog (right) I won't tell you what the diagnosis is. But I will say that I got a respite from being Kelly for a whole class period today, and it was like a cool breeze.

Walking out into the snowy afternoon, the fear came back. (For both me, and Amanda, I'd imagine.) Fear that I won't be able to do it. Fear that God has stopped downloading to me. Fear that I'm a hack and a phony.

Fear that I'll write more, and then I'll get more feedback.

So funny to be on the receiving end of the feedback loop after so many years of being the one giving it. It kind of sucks. But I'm trying to remember that there's a reason they call it "constructive" criticism. I talked to my client again this afternoon and she once again repeated everything she said yesterday that I hadn't heard: the structure and voice and content are all there, 100%. She just wants a little more heart.

She prescribed me 4 pages of Anne Lamott and to write a paragraph about a moment when I felt like I had really landed something I've written. It helped. Go figure. (I'm a Capricorn, and we love assignments.)

Feedback is like a kumquat. When you first bite down, you've never tasted anything so sour, so bitter. But the longer you chew it, the sweeter it gets. When you're done all you want is another kumquat.

This round, I'm still in the bitter phase. Waiting for the sweetness. Waiting for the sweetness.