because every day is all there is
It's been almost two weeks since I've written anything, an eternity by my standards. I told Kayla I've been "fake busy", by which I mean I've had lots to do, though not nearly enough to excuse neglecting the blog.
On Monday I took the final round interview for the NYC position. I felt silly dressing up in a suit and tie to write fake emails but was relieved to find the hourlong assessment manageable. I took every minute my proctor gave me to edit and proofread and after I sent in my work I tried my best to turn off my brain.
I'd never done a writing assessment before and was honestly quite nervous going into it. Would my lack of professional writing experience be exposed? I needn't have worried. Even after not writing anything for several days I felt so much more comfortable writing and editing plain English than I ever had coding in any language. Writing doesn't carry any of the anxiety I've accumulated from years of failing coding challenges.
After a rather grueling wait (including multiple cruelly teasing emails and delays) the recruiter called me back today and offered me the job. I can't decide if I'm more excited or relieved. I'm trying to rein in my excitement, because who knows if I'll like this job? But I can't deny the joy I feel to have an opportunity to move to New York, to try a new career path, to escape and live on my own after so many years at home with my parents.
The reason I haven't written all these days is because I was afraid I'd jinx the outcome by writing about it. I can't write here without spilling every little detail of my life, so I refrained from writing entirely. I sorely missed the catharsis and creative act of journaling and am so glad to be back. It's silly of me to entertain such superstitions, and landing this offer will likely only worsen this irrationality.
I came across this tweet the other day while obsessing over that Joan Didion excerpt I posted and I absolutely adore it.
"Because every day is all there is." — Joan Didion, to a New York Times reporter, explaining why she put her "good" china to routine, everyday use. It has always been one of my favorite Didion lines, though it never appeared in any of her writings.
It reminds me of that Annie Dillard quote1 and sums up my writing/blogging philosophy nicely. What better way is there to live than to treat the humble day as all there is?
"How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing. A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time. A schedule is a mock-up of reason and order—willed, faked, and so brought into being; it is a peace and a haven set into the wreck of time; it is a lifeboat on which you find yourself, decades later, still living." - Annie Dillard, The Writing Life↩