Past the Deadline

I've passed the deadline on a few personal projects, for which I have little accountability and for which no one is materially harmed in their delay. I feel like I expend so much meeting everyone else's deadlines (pause for applause?), that by the time my own start to approach, they become malleable in texture. A date turns into a season turns into a chapter turns into a life phase. "I'm not ready for that yet," I say right up until I begin.

I remember walking into an audition once, and with every bare footstep on the Marley floor I heard the voice in my head saying, "Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it." Now when I hear that voice, I know it's just me getting closer.