I have always been a perfectionist. It’s in my DNA, my father was the same. I remember rewriting homework while in elementary school because it didn’t look good enough to me. Now 50, nothing has changed in this regard except the homework, thank goodness.
What is it they say? That God has a wicked sense of humor? Well, they sure got that right. Oh, I see Sister Rain is a perfectionist. Let’s shake things up and render her visually challenged. Make some popcorn, this is gonna be a hoot.
Three years into this journey of vision loss, I still don’t know all the lessons I am to learn. I am aware that perfectionism and significant loss of sight don’t go together. I don’t quite know how to lower my standards and the experts don’t yet know how to repair my optic nerves. What that leaves in its wake are frustration and disappointment. And major avoidance when a project starts to go awry, in my eyes that is. Ironically.
An undertaking to create gifts for friends has sat untouched for months because more than halfway to completion, I wasn’t happy with how they were turning out. My husband says they look great and that I am too hard on myself. He has been telling me this for 25 years. He possibly, sorta kinda, could maybe, on a day that ends in “y”, just this one time, be right.
Maybe the solution is not to take on these ventures that will only cause me this internal battle. But that’s me too: taking on projects and planning and executing to my personal level of quality. The desire to hold on to as much of me as possible outweighs the challenges that come with that. Before things went fuzzy, I was able to put my creativity to use at work. Now my need to produce high caliber “product” manifests itself in this blog and in different endeavors I throw myself into.
I will return to and complete these presents for my girls. Stubbornness and determination are also in my makeup. Unlike George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg, with no disrespect to the brave men they portrayed, the USS Sister Rain will not sink. The ocean that is my visual impairment and the hurricane that is my perfectionism will converge and I will persevere to bring the projects into port to the best of my ability and try to cut myself a break while doing it. Doesn’t that sound perfect?
