Learning to Stop Worrying and Love my Laptop
How my computer became an object of dread, and how I'm hoping to change that 👨💻
Hello there!
This is issue #15 of Light Gray Matters. It will get a bit more personal than usual. I did warn you in the first issue, didn’t I?
I’ll share parts of recent essays I have published (see below for an example). Teach you a thing I learned. Tell you about my life. (I’m not sure that you should care about my life. Maybe I’m writing more for myself than for you. Sorry.)
There. I’m writing this for myself. You’re welcome to pretend you’re my therapist, if you like.
This week, I had a very bad Monday. I was off from my Official Day Job, and I thought I’d use the time to write and/or start on a freelance programming gig I have and/or write and/or do some work for Interintellect and/or write. I ended up doing almost none of those things.
I did nothing because I felt horrible whenever I was sitting at my computer.
Part of it was procrastination-related. Being distracted by random stuff on social media and the news and so on doesn’t make you feel good, and my Monday had plenty of that.
But I think the main problem was… the physical object I use to perform all my important tasks and projects. The computer itself.
I.e. this very nice 16 inch 2020 MacBook Pro that I bought last summer:
(thank you Apple for making products that are mercifully easy to draw)
(though I made life more complicated for myself with all these little dots… they’re supposed to represent the grey coloration, okay?)
It’s a great computer. When I first got it, it made everything in my life more fun, including, importantly, that Official Day Job I mentioned already — which has been work-from-home for almost a year now.
But over time, I made mental associations between that job and the computer. It is the tool I use for work. Therefore, it is not a fun tool. The other (fun) things that I do with it… have stopped being fun. On days like Monday, I dread using the computer, even to write my amazing novel about Quebec history and filmmaking.
There was much talk, at the beginning of the pandemic, of cleanly delineating your work and your life. For instance, you should not work in the bedroom. Keep it for sleep and relaxation (and whatever else you do in a bedroom). Don’t associate the bedroom with stressful situations!
Well, I followed the bedroom advice. I didn’t generalize it to the other rooms, though, and worked variously in the kitchen, dining room, living room, study, and even on the patio during the summer, which in retrospect wasn’t great because now I dislike being at home (and yes I am still stuck in it). But the computer is the more important bit, simply because of how central it has become to everything — from work to social life to creative projects.
This isn’t a great situation to be in.
Which is why I’m solving it with the nuclear option: quitting the Official Day Job.
Okay, no, I am not quitting just for that. I’ve been considering quitting for a year, and for a variety of reasons, most importantly because I’m not a fan of being an employee.
But I am hoping that this will improve my relationship with my computer. I worry a little bit that things will just get worse, since as a “freelancer” (I still hesitate to call myself that) everything will be tied to my computer, but I remain optimistic. A major source of stress will be gone. Soon, the computer will start feeling again like this magical object, this portal to so many people and art and fun that it truly is. Soon, I will once again be excited when I open it and get to work.
On Friday, when I become a free man again, I will close all my tabs. I will clean my folders. I will delete the VPN thingy that allows me to connect to my workplace environment.
Then I will shut the laptop down and tuck it away for a couple of days.
Will that be sufficient to cleanse all the feelings of burnout? I can’t wait to find out.
But rest assured that I will be back next Wednesday for issue #16, as I remain
Soon unemployedly yours,
Étienne
P.S. I ALMOST FORGOT THE BUTTONS
On Twitter: Drawing the moon
The only somewhat productive thing I did on Monday was… this thread about drawing the moon right. Featuring more of my low-key hand drawings, and a lot of extremely important advice!
On Interintellect: Ted Chiang and God
I will be taking my computer outside of its nest at least for a few hours on Sunday night as I hold the second edition of my monthly Ted Chiang book club! Join us, we’ll be talking about two wonderful stories that combine science-fiction and religion, it’ll be as glorious as a flock of angels crossing the skies to fight a holy war against demons…
