Winter doldrums

Winter doldrums appear to have set in for me. The writing I want to do I do not do, and the writing I do not want to do isn’t getting done either. Several projects have stalled until I find the energy and inspiration to get them started again.

• I want to write the second part of my post, “Your body is a temple of God.” I have many ideas of what I want to say, but they seem to be crowded together rather than lined up in an orderly fashion.
• I want to finish copyediting my “Christ in Genesis” series and publish them together as one ebook (linked, of course, to the “free books from Salvageable” page of this blog). I have the text gathered into one document, but I cannot seem to make myself read it one more time for further improvements.
• I want to do a “childhood memories” post to follow my four posts on sugar, detailing the first and longest addiction of my life with reflections on how we make addicts of our children.
• I want to write a post about the so-called Synoptic Problem, a discussion of similarities and differences among the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. (This is prompted, in mark, because during my daily devotions I have been reading Augustine’s “Harmony of the Four Gospels.”)
• I want to comment again, in a curmudgeonly way, on the bad drivers I encounter on a regular basis.
• I also want to comment in a curmudgeonly way on the way some people mistreat the opportunities entrusted to them to preserve the history of their families or organizations with photographs.

When I have trouble writing, the trouble is never caused by having nothing to say. I have too much to say, so much that my thoughts sometimes become stuck like a group of men in a comic movie trying to go through the same doorway at the same time. Even so, mood and attitude shape the way that I write, and so far this month my mood has been sour–not depressed or fearful, just sour–and my attitude has been motivationally challenged.

Other projects have also lagged. The house still needs a good post-Christmas cleaning. I’ve not practiced the guitar in ages. I need to organize my financial papers, discard those that are no longer relevant, and be ready to file my taxes once my W-2s have arrived.

I have managed to pursue one project that is out of the ordinary. Being a highly sensitive person, I thought I might be qualified to tune pianos. I got a book on the topic for Christmas one year, followed by the basic needed equipment the next Christmas. I toyed with the family piano, but a tuner can learn only so much from one piano. For that reason, I asked two congregations for permission to learn by tuning their neglected pianos. Even after receiving permission, I was hesitant to get started, thinking that in my inexperience, I might make things worse instead of better.

The last two Saturday afternoons, I have finally started working on one piano that was badly out of shape. Several keys did not work at all. When I took the panels off the piano, I found that several mechanical parts had fallen to the bottom of the piano. One hammer is broken and needs to be replaced, but I got the rest of the keys working. After that, it was time to start tuning.

Both Saturdays I have gotten about half-way through, only to discover that the tuning was not succeeding. Without being too technical, piano tuners rely on certain intervals (distances between musical notes) to tune a piano, while using other intervals to check their work. When I was about half-way done, I started checking my work and found mistakes that have to be corrected. I ended up stopping at that point–one can only listen to notes and intervals so long before losing sensitivity to pitch.

Possibly, the piano is drifting out of tune on its own, since it is in such bad shape. Another problem is that, as I become more tired, I sometimes turn the wrong peg–instead of correcting the string I want to correct, I’m putting a nearby string out of tune. With determination and perseverance, though, I will get this piano somewhat into tune and then move on to another piano.

Winter doldrums can be defeated. They can be attributed the need for rest after an active holiday season, to lack of sunshine, and to reduced exercise (with the weather a handy excuse). Even a brief walk outdoors on a sunny day, an occasional dose of Vitamin D, or a new hobby can provide mental energy and incentive.

And, while we’re in the neighborhood, what ideas and topics would you like me to address in future posts? J.