I did not sleep well last night. I began working yesterday, when I had other things to do, on a project I had started weeks ago. I became totally engrossed in what I was creating that I kept tweaking it. I kept thinking, “I’ll finish this part and stop for the day,” only for more ideas to formulate in my mind that had to be added immediately before I forgot. I thought I’d finished it last night, but as I couldn’t stop thinking about the project and wanting to add more. I jotted down more notes for what needed to be added. Finally, I forced my mind to quiet and allow me to get some sleep.
It’s rare that I get so preoccupied with a project. Usually, it only happens when I’m working on a class preparing a lecture or a particular blog post. This was different. This was a project for me. I’ll share the final project with a few special people in my life, but I’m not ready to finish it yet. There’s still more to do, but I have to work today. I have papers to grade, classes s to prepare for, and what seems like a dozen other things I put off yesterday.
Do you ever get absorbed by something to the point it becomes an obsession?
Joe
The Closet Professor 
April 14th, 2025 at 3:31 pm
I am extremely good at getting lost in a project—it could be reading/or writing a book, doing research, drafting a pleading…I wrote several hundred pages of manuscript for a book loosely based on my grandfather’s life (born in Geneva AL). His mother died giving birth to him and then he was bounced to SC where her relatives were paid to raise him. He went to work for a railroad and moved around the country before joining the Navy in World War I. What I found particularly fascinating is that he was stationed in Newport, RI and was there when a major drug and sex scandal broke. They were selling cocaine out of the infirmary and an Episcopal priest was running a call boy operation out of the YMCA. I even found correspondence with my grandfather’s bed number in the infirmary! This scandal helped raise
FDR’s profile because he was in the Navy Dept. in DC and used the scandal to attack the Republican senators from RI. It was this scandal that precipitated the formation of NCIS. Lord, I went down a lot of blind alleys researching gay life in various cities where my grandfather lived. I never found anything to suggest that my grandfather was gay, but my entire life I was always compared to him and it’s obvious he had done things he never talked about. He eventually was assigned to operations in Europe and spent time in Holland and France. I had a relationship with a guy from Holland, who I met on a train in the US. I subsequently went to Holland and visited him…boy was he a good kisser! But he got involved in drugs and moved to Colombia and I had no desire to join him there. See what I mean about getting distracted? Thanks Joe!
April 14th, 2025 at 3:34 pm
Yeah, Theo had bounced to Uganda (he got deported from there for being gay) landed in Australia where his mother lived and finally got to Colombia where he taught tropical agriculture. Fascinating, sexy guy!!!