From start to... what was that word again?

I'll take Bakablog entries for $500, Alex. What is "Finish"?

It seems that word is becoming more and more a foreign concept for me. I can think of so many times when I was young and complaining I was bored. It seemed as if there was never anything to keep me busy on those long summer days. Mind you, being bored beat the alternative of school, but it never stopped me from complaining.

Those were the days when I would get an idea and immediately set to work on it, pouring my free time into it and relentlessly knocking against the idea until it was fully realized and complete. Have an idea for a comic? No problem. I'd grab some blank paper and get a sketching until my "epic" 5 or 6 pager was done. Got a new video game? There goes my nights and weekends until I knew it inside out. There was rarely a multitasking moment.

Where have those days gone? It seems like now I can't ever stay focused on anything for too long. I get an idea, I spring into action to get it going, and before I know it, it's fallen through some invisible cracks. It's not uncommon for me to have about a dozen things on the go, and sadly not also uncommon for half of those to barely pass the first lap of the race before getting sidelined.

I think it's from having gone from one extreme to the other. I went from having too much time on my hands, to having too little. And watching my free time tick away, I've branched off into so many directions that my little self-projects are all going snail speed.

I've been working at it, though. I've been limiting how many new ideas I actually follow through with and start - because I know the dead end those usually lead to. I've reserved the things I start for those I truly plan to stick with go forward. And it's tough, but I've dug into the old desktop folders for those unfinished ideas of before to drudge them up and continue.

Every start has an end. It just so happens that some races take place on tougher trails than others...