It might be the effect of the haircut, but I feel lighter today, and not just in my head. (Hey!) Something has lifted my spirits, for no reason. At least, for no reason that I can figure out. For no logical or obvious reason. I just feel more centered, if that makes any sense. Less scattered.

Okay, I should try to explain that (at least to myself).

It's really the same effect that getting enough sleep has. I think more clearly, and that makes me realize that I can think clearly. When I think clearly, I work efficiently, and that lets me know that I can be efficient. Once I start feeling better about my own ability to do my job, and live my life, I relax and stop worrying about the petty details that sometimes eat at me.

This feeling ordinarily lasts until the next time I don't sleep well. Or the next time I need a haircut so badly that I'm embarrassed to be seen in public.

How does it happen that the more I get done, the messier my desk gets? Somehow work generates more work. If I could start at the top of a pile and keep going until I got to the bottom, I would have a feeling of accomplishment. Things would make sense.

Instead, something at the top of the pile will cause me to have to start a new pile. By the time I'm halfway down the first pile, I have a dozen little piles. Sometimes I don't know which pile something goes in, or maybe it belongs in two or three different piles. When that happens I usually just start another sub-pile.

I like to be organized, but I don't like to organize. Once things start getting skewed, I lose interest in straightening them out again. Sometimes I reach the point where I lose interest in doing anything at all. That lasts until I get so far behind that it doesn't matter where I start, because everything has to be done at once.

Thinking about these cosmic questions, I realized something today. No matter how hard I work or how much time I put in, I'll never get caught up. That's kind of a liberating thought.

My job (and therefore my life) would be easier if the Boss gave me clear instructions that made sense, instead of telling me everything that's on his mind and asking me to try to sort it out. Yeah, it's not his job to make my life easier. It's my job to make his life easier. But does he have to complicate every action and every decision for no better reason than because he can?

Last week he called and said that we were going to have to pay one of the subcontractors we hired half of their contract amount before we could even bill the owner. I'm scrambling around to pay day-to-day bills, and he's telling me we have to front twenty thousand dollars because he made a deal with somebody and didn't bother to tell me until the bill comes due.

"Just think about it," he told me, "and try to come up with a way to pay them without borrowing on the high interest credit lines."

Okay, no problem. I'll give up my paycheck for the week. That only leaves us a little more than nineteen and a half thousand short.

It turned out not to be as big a problem as it could have been, because we got several big checks in over the weekend. I made the mistake of telling him, and he wanted me to come up with a list of creditors to pay. I reminded him about this subcontractor, and suggested I write that check first, since the guy would walk off the job if he wasn't paid up front.

The Boss was enthusiastic about my idea, and I wrote the check. Then he called and told me to hold the check, because the work hadn't been done yet. So I've been scurrying and scrambling for four days, trying to find money to pay someone that we can't pay yet anyway. Meanwhile, real bills are going unpaid, which brings creditors knocking at my door. Which is why I keep moving.