The hard part about writing personal essays

OK, so you think it's not hard writing personal essays. You're right, it isn't. You just talk about yourself, right?

But the best personal essays are those heartwrenchingly honest pieces that really deliver for the reader. The ones that your poor blood into, that you break your heart over.

Well, I tried to do that. I tried to write a piece -- humorous, no less -- about my cardio problems. After I tried to write it, I found myself getting anxious and worried. Whatever I did, I couldn't make it funny. Instead, I was faced with my mortality, which in your early 30s, is not something you think you have to deal with. Anyway it freaked me out, I shelved the essay, and told my editor it wasn't working out.

Know your limitations. If you haven't faced what you're dealing with, you will when you write it. And the end result may not be very pretty or, in my case, lucrative.

My new migraines!

Apparently, I am so stressed out that I'm getting migraines again. With work, graduate school and occasional freelancing I'm stress-eating, not getting enough sleep and feeling so angry I could rip someone's arm off.

The last time I had migraines was during undergrad. When I look back, those were less stressful time -- well, not really, because they made me take math and physics. Now I just write and read, and that's not half as stressful. But the work is. The special project, too. OK, better stop, I feel another one coming on.

I'm working on the personal essay right now, and I realize they just make me all emotional and crazy. Apparently I have a lot of pain I haven't dealt with. Duh! I guess, in a highly dysfunctional way, I'm dealing with it.

Now, I have to go and get some sleep. Take care all of you!