Jessica Peill-Meininghaus - The Gnome Project: One Womans Wild and Woolly Adventure

To anyone who has ever thought that they couldnt

A s far back as I can remember, I have never finished anything not a darn thing not unless someone made sure that I did with the fierceness of a schoolmarm or the enticement of sweets at the end.

For years, my mothers attic was a veritable museum of my unfinished works: a rug-hooking project gone wrong from when I was ten; the map of the United States that I started embroidering when I was twelve; and drawings, poems, and sewing and crafting projects from various ages. The list was long and, quite frankly, embarrassing, and it was all tucked away in labeled boxes with the good intention to finish someday. Everyone knows how it goes with good intentions, so lets not go there, shall we? Mine just didnt go. At all.

Eventually, my mother and I purged most of it, tossing it out or, if it was usable, donating it to a thrift store. All except that half-embroidered map. That is still in a drawer somewhere in my house waiting to be completed, a ghost of what it surely could become.

I kept thinking I would grow out of this strange incapacity to finish anything, the way you grow out of a pair of pants or sucking your thumb. Eventually, I would know what I needed to do to follow through. It would come to me like an epiphany, and I would suddenly be one of those people. You know the type the kind of person who is fully capable of saying she is going to do something and then actually doing it. A real grown-up.

Id seen others manage this feat, whether it was the lofty goal of learning a second language with the fluidity of a native or reading a new book every single month (or week or day), or something as simple as going for a daily walk.

All around me there were people making goals for themselves and accomplishing them. Sometimes they did it without a backward glance. Sometimes they hit a few faltering steps before finding their stride but they always seemed to find their stride. And then there were those who executed follow-through with so much grace that I wanted to scream at them and tell them to stop making something so tragically difficult look so darn easy.

When a high school friend started running daily, I felt the inspiration to get into shape and join in this new endeavor, albeit solo since we lived in different neighborhoods. I tied on some sneakers and took to the pavement. I lasted two days. The pain combined with the mere thought of forcing myself to endure another moment of discomfort was too much. Sure, I would eventually be fit enough that running would feel amazing, but I wasnt going to make it that far.

Then there was the time I decided to study marine biology. I went to the library, loaded up on the books they had, ordered the books they didnt, and went home to begin. Begin is all I did. That endeavor lasted about a week. I fell into the pattern of Ill do that later, right now I want to be outside/watch a movie/hang out with a friend. You get the picture.

My particular brand of disability didnt seem to affect everything. It didnt affect my schoolwork. In an effort to please my teachers and have a stellar transcript, I completed every single extra credit assignment they offered. Meeting deadlines for reports and finishing work issued by my teachers was pretty much a walk in the park. But the stuff that my friends managed on their own: exercising or keeping a daily journal or learning to play the guitar, using only their steadfast initiative to keep them engaged? That eluded me.

If I was accountable to someone, I could get the job done. But as soon as the commands were being issued only by me? Well, that was an entirely different story. If it didnt profit my family or friends in some way or another and by profit I mean joy or money or food I couldnt do it.

As a single person, you learn to adjust. You go to work, you read a book, you make dinner you avoid situations that might bring on that feeling of failure. For me, that meant that I tried not to set goals, but even that wasnt something I could stick to. As humans, we are constantly striving to learn and change and evolve you might even go so far as to say that we cant help but be capricious. Im not any different. Still, despite a history of unmet goals, I strove to accomplish project after project on my own, and I failed over and over again.

When I got married and children came along, I managed well enough. Pregnancy was easy, if you overlook the hyperemesis. Along with the extreme nausea and vomiting, my body did what it wanted, regardless of my personal preferences on the matter, and babies were just that: babies. I wore them in slings, nursed them when they were hungry, and tried to steal sleep when they slept. There wasnt a need for follow-through; there were just instinctual answers to primal needs that create the unique bond between parent and infant. I could do that in my sleep and about half the time, I did.

It was when the children grew older, when they could walk and talk and yell Mine! or No! and begin to struggle with the way the world works, that I discovered how incredibly important follow-through is. In fact, it is indispensable. When my children hit that stage, suddenly my lack of follow-through affected more than just me. It became a disability, like having one arm. I couldnt keep things in check.

It was time to seek the help of an expert.

A delia knows follow-through. In fact, she knows it so well, it is as if she has merged with it, providing a physical body in which follow-through can hang out and make the rest of the world jealous. Whenever I stopped by, her house was, without fail, spotless and organized. It was Martha Stewart meets the Goodwill Goddess, and like Mary Poppins, it was practically perfect in every way.

The couch, used but carefully covered with a lovely blanket, was smooth without a wrinkle in sight, and plump pillows had been issued to each end, set neatly, at an angle, into the corners. The rugs were vacuumed, and the curtains were even and opened appropriately for the amount of light at that particular moment in the day. The kitchen was organized and clean, and the floors were freshly mopped. The houseplants thrived, flashing their lush, radiant foliage from their various, carefully chosen perches. And Adelia had a child. Granted, there was only the one to my four, but she did have a child, so the well-worn argument of Well, it looks like that now, but wait until she has kids wouldnt fly.