Reluctant to admit

I lied to my teacher today on the phone when he called from the hospital to check and see how my chamber pot progress was going. I didn't want him to know I had not touched it since Thursday. He called when I was lunching w/Esther and Steph, two Fulbrighters nearly a decade younger than me but very good at advising me. Once I got home, I did other things for a few hours before I finally buckled down to work on the piece. I am a little over halfway to the point that I told him I was at. And now I realize this very simple fact, which I have been in denial about my entire life: if you don't do your work, you lose those work days, and they're gone forever. There's no doing double/triple time in the days remaining to make up for lost time. You're just behind.

I can't cheat time, even if I try really, really hard. I recognize that in exchange for not doing my work, I instead had lots of dopamine spikes over the last week. I'm feeling incredibly torn about my research, too. I'm setting up opportunities that work for my hands (more like, my hands work for them), but I've backburnered all my field work since December. The tricky thing is that I want it done by April, but I also want to stay put and work until April. The trickier thing is that I don't want to do the field work anymore. But then I get that nagging "what if?" feeling: what if this is the only opportunity I get to keep making these visits and contacts and I'll blow it if I concentrate on learning new skills. This is the problem with having an over-ambitious research plan, and being indecisive.

The bad news: While I continue not to decide what to do and what to cut, time keeps running. And now my weekend is booked - I had forgotten that my friend from Japan is visiting and I have to take her sightseeing, and one of my paper teachers in Seoul wants to see me about some exhibit. There goes my catch-up studio time.

The good news: I've finally run out of blue cord that I spun in January, so I can't distract myself any longer by making gourds. Also, I've restocked my brownie supply in hopes that chocolate will keep me afloat until July.