One of my favorite moments in The Office is in season three, a special episode entitled “Beach Games.” At this point, a lot of us have seen The Office so I’m not going to go into unnecessary details, but my favorite part starts when Michael introduces the coal walk as a management parable (genius, right?). After he chickens out on doing the walk and Dwight fails to suck up, Michael segues into another segment of his management search. A lone Pam stands in front of the hot coals, and she scampers across. She does it in a mere amount of seconds, without any witnesses. She doesn’t need to do the coal walk, she does it because she wants to. And her sudden rush of adrenaline brings on an honest moment of revelation.
I know it’s a silly sitcom that we all love. In our family, we’ve watched seasons 1-4 so many times that it’s now a source of background noise when nothing else is on tv. But Pam is a character I’ve always related to, even back in middle school when I watched the show on live cable, and her coal walk monologue is significant to me.
‘I’ve been trying to be more honest lately. And I just need to say a few things.”
I’m in my final semester of working as a GA at Hollins University and I’m not quite sure what will happen next. I’m ready to move forward, but I’m uncertain where forward is. I’m still working on my picture books and my middle grade novel (which at this point has become my baby because I’ve spent so much time with it and I care for it very much). But the publishing road is an arduous journey that is hard to break into. It’s honestly like trying to bust through a fortress and I don’t have a battering ram just yet. I have some tools thanks to grad school, SCBWI, and networking, but still I have a ways to go before I make it through. I’m 26 years old and some things that I thought would’ve happened by now haven’t, and I am a swirling tempest of happiness, sadness, indifference, and blessedness.
So what now? Well, I’ve been inconsistent with blogging and part of me wants to be better with it, especially at a time like this where folks have been holed up as this crazy pandemic rages on. But besides the consistent posting, the interviews, the few articles of travel and outdoors-related adventure, like Pam, I want to be more honest here. I’m spending less time on social media because I find it very 2D and surface-level, plus there’s just so much noise (how’s that for honesty?). But here, it’s more quiet and I can share stories. There’s a danger to having too much screen time, but when I’m on my own website and blog, I plan on making my occasional blog posts count.
So for starters, I’ll admit I need to be more like Pam and just go for the coal walks life has to offer. It’s hard to be an introvert in a family of extroverts. It’s easy to be an introvert in a world where we’re told to stay inside and wear a mask when we venture into public places. I still can’t believe this is our situation right now. But it’s also a time for me to reflect on things, to move forward and not wallow in self-pity. If anything, this pandemic has reminded me that I need to focus on what truly matters. And what truly matters to me involves surrounding myself with folks I love, with places I enjoy frequenting, with memories I like to revisit to draw writing and artistic inspiration from.
Time is fleeting. I think I can get a project started and completed in a week, then days later I haven’t even started yet. Hopefully writing about my shortcomings on here will help with accountability. Life just isn’t that long, and I don’t want to be silent about things that matter to me. So with the future of this blog in mind, I’m prepared to write more about my relationship with Jesus, because faith is extremely important to me and it’s something that I unfortunately don’t talk about enough. Get ready for more posts on books that I like, personal challenges, family, trips (fingers crossed), music, and whatever God has in store for me. Look for more personality and meaning; I’ll be sharing more introspection and thoughts, and as always, look forward to more artwork.
“Okay, I am gonna go walk in the water now.”