These days I spend most of my time in and traveling between fairly different situations, and I find it remarkable how such situations are crucibles for precipitating certain rudiments of character. For myself, it seems the same traits emerge across even widely disparate situations, and through that single observation I can come to know something of the fundamental composition of my self.

Know what I mean?

I've been given a reprieve on the mammoth copyediting project at hand. This is a huge relief, as the project is, perhaps, the most expansive wheat field I've ever approached. The biggest obstacle is my persistent avoidance of the work. It's like I need to schedule three hours of procrastination into the day—That would be three hours on top of the 7.5 required to complete the project by its original deadline, and the four or so hours of stopping-the-buck work I do for the empire. Then there's the running schedule, the mandatory stretching, too; sporadic and sudden hours at my university job; and volunteer hours at the lab.

In short, I have been freaking out and procrastinating like there's no tomorrow.

I just can't copyedit anymore. It takes too much singularity to focus on every single character on the page—for 145 pages.

When editors die they go to a heaven where they tell other people what to fix. Or, we get promoted to some such empyrean position while we still live.

Every once in a while I meet a preretiree who has made a career of copyediting. I swear that each one I've met was a soft-spoken, patient soul, the kind you imagine leaves a long day of other people's words behind for a quiet night of working the NY Times crossword puzzle or a long-tended cross-stitch project. They always say, "Yes, that's defensible," and I love them for that simple confidence. I've learned that one virtue from them at least. But these encounters confirm that I am not a copyeditor. For all my apparent calm, I'm really much more cowgirl about things—impulsive and creative. I'd much rather be driving than merely navigating.