Avoidance tactics or should that be antics

Oh, and I really should sort out the washing for the launderette…

And then I need to clip my toenails….

Anything to avoid actually sitting down and facing a blank screen/page/canvas/ whatever….

Yes, I know that this is the curse of all writers/artists/ and actually most people I can think of, and that self discipline is required (but not of the sort practised by sad and strange people who like to clamp their nipples to hot radiators) but I find myself prevaricating about my life, all of it, not just sitting down to write but anything that is important and that would help me get to where I am going or would make me happy.

And as for stuff that I have decided is important and that I need to do, well I could do this avoidance shit at Olympic level.

Take my German homework as an example. I know that doing it helps my German and I want my German to regain its fluency (that really sounds as if my German could do that all on its own, which would be really nice, but alas it doesn’t quite work like that). I also know that doing it reasonably soon after class helps me to remember what I have learned and helps me to retain that memory. It also means that the homework, by virtue of still being in the short-term memory bit of the mush inside my head, is actually easier. I KNOW ALL OF THIS. So why am I writing this drivel and not doing my homework?

What deeply perverse psychcological warp is there in my character that I would rather write about not doing my German homework than actually do the effing homework even though I know as a wise and grown-up person of sorts that this is what I should be doing and can point out to myself various previous failings to serve as examples from which I should have learnt? What is it? I would love to know.

I mean, I could get all cosmic about it and say that the universe is telling me, very sotto voce, that this is more important than my German, and that as I am so attuned to the universe I have no option but to listen, but that would be bollocks.  The universe has only ever muttered stuff to me when my consciousness has been ever-so-slightly altered and it usually muttered stuff about how gorgeously wonderful I was and how I could touch the moon if only I could see it and wasn’t that green mouse on the barman’s head just dinky. Not exactly useful stuff and very often forgotten once it had been muttered, usually mid-sentence.

And then there is the possibility that somewhere buried deep in my soul, there is something that actually knows what I really should be doing and doing this right now isn’t avoiding German homework, it is actually what I should be doing right now. Now that I have written that down, it sounds a tad like the universe excuse, except that the agent of the avoidance is me and internal, rather than the universe and external. Same shit though…. This would also sort of imply that I had a level of interior calm and wisdom, an idea that makes me laugh and probably has my nearest and dearest roaring and wiping tears of laughter from their eyes, the bastards.

BUT, I know I should be doing the homework and I should be doing it now. I will have forgotten everything I was taught today if I leave it until tomorrow, or even Sunday and then I will be cross with myself and it will take for ever and I will have wasted much time that could be better spent clipping my toenails, making another cup of tea or sorting out the laundry.

I wonder if I could fool myself into thinking that I really really really need to get on with the novel (fifth attempt at Great English Novel) and then I will find myself doing my German homework, or would I instead find something else to distract me from both of those activities?

So excuse me, as I have remembered that I have a couple of friends coming round for a drink later and I really must clean the bathroom, honestly, and then I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea and……