In Which Soaring Soprano is...

...doing it again.

A week has now gone by without a post, and I found myself already slipping into my bad habit of saying, "I don't have anything cool to write about." And I wondered if I wasn't just making an excuse for myself?

I mean, I am a chronic procrastinator, and I put things off until the last minute or even indefinitely... I have so many half-started and unfinished projects laying around it's not funny. 

Ugh.

Anyway, I'm starting to think that this need of mine to have something "important" to say isn't just an ego thing. I think it's more of an excuse not to post, to put off until tomorrow what I could do today. It's not like I have any lack of time, either. I'm a secretary, and at my job many hours are spent with nothing to do, just waiting for the phone to ring. Which means I have plenty of time to write a blog post everyday... even just a short one.

I really need to take to heart something a priest- very fittingly nicknamed Father Boots, because he always wore black cowboy boots with his cassock- told me once about procrastination.

I had been crying to him about my propensity for procrastination, and all the troubles it was causing (I lived at home at the time and my Mom was very tired of having to remind me fifty times to get something done).

Father Boots nodded and looked at me very solemnly. "Well," he said, in his deep voice (which I always thought was how God's voice would sound). "Do you know what to do the next time you are tempted to procrastinate?"

I bit my lip and shook my head, prepared to be chastised.

"Just tell yourself, 'I'll procrastinate later,'" he said. "It's as simple as that."

My poor teenaged female brain mulled that over for a second and I nodded, still silent. Whenever Father Boots said something solemnly, I couldn't help but to become mute and very seriously puzzle over his pronouncements.

This time a little twinkle came into his eyes and he smiled at me.

Then a light bulb went on in my head and I started to laugh. (I was still a bit slow about catching onto sarcasm at that age.)

Despite the humour, there is a great truth hidden there. And it has served me well... when I've happened to remember it.