Back at the farm

I have been getting a lot of material lately and frankly the shop is getting so crowded that I am feeling a little psychically strangled.

Hard to breathe in here with all of my physical and mental clutter. Middle aged man, desperately seeking oxygen. Have so many sniggling little things to do and can't seem to find my rhythm.

I have received the bulk of two large estates in the last month and I am working on the end of a third. Painting are piled on paintings and navigation and ambulation is difficult. Luckily I have been open by appointment only the last several months and my customers do not seem too concerned by the chaos.

My shop was once very large, now every nook and cranny is filled like your worst reality show hoarder. It has gotten very small all of a sudden. Fortunately for me, this is all pretty good material, some of it quite good.

All this stuff is making it hard for me to work, let alone move around. First the decorator's estate from Houston, now suffering from dementia. That is the reason for all the naked putti cupids and the nude male figures, not some, late in life, personal change in course I am undergoing.

The race car driver's haul is mostly a lot of rare books, some great 18th century stuff that I couldn't bear see go to a garage sale. Staffordshire dogs, majolica, a lovely 18th century maple dropfront.

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I am an incessant list maker. From my days as a project manager and contractor to present, I have lived off yellow manilla pads. Crossing tasks off. Making new lists. I have learned that the more you have to do, the more you get done, simplistic as that sounds. When things are slow, nothing seems to ever get accomplished.

I am starting my fourth and most critical course book for the educational company. Then the fifth. I need to free my mind from all of this clutter in order to devote the necessary time to the professional writing. Have started cleaning the office, preparing myself to go under, to find the solitude I need to write and to do the best possible job that I can. Juggling everything so that I can give each and every task the proper care and attention they deserve.

And so I sweep up all the remaining loose ends. Then it's down periscope.