/writing/ Watching It Send

I SIT, WATCHING an email being processed. Attached is a large donor report that’s worth a substantial amount of money.

A slow connection offers me time to reflect.

It’s been a typical reporting process: intermittent, often unreliable information from the program teams; an ever-changing structure that can’t find its legs; last minute data corrections that undermine entire section narratives.

This is the work, though. We slog through it.

We write each draft, naively believing this will be the last, only for it to be torn apart. Our hopes dashed again.

We do it over and over, our instincts becoming ever slightly more refined. We are learning, though it may not feel like it.

Until, [deep breath]…it’s ready to be shared as a final product.

But deep down we know – there WILL be more changes. If not on this report, the next one. And the one after that.

At least for now, I try to enjoy the relief of clicking send.

Thanks for reading.