This week, I’ve been working four close-to-my-heart writing projects, and teaching five college composition courses.

Me and the words — we’re tight these days.

The only word I’m not involved with lately is: “No,”  as in “No, I’m too busy to do that.”  I think it comes from being a freelancing adjunct consultant — which means I can be let go at any time from any one of five jobs for any reason.  How’s that for flexibility?  And although my employers all express satisfaction with my work, and continuously send more my way, and reassure me that I’m on board for the long haul, my sense that I’m about to have no income – and starve and die and drag my kids down with me – looms.

I guess I have trust issues.

I also do love words and story and all my work.  So when the phone rings, and I get offered a gig editing business reports online after midnight, or teaching an extra class from my car on my lunch hour, or some such oddity, I’ll usually jump at it — even though I am already booked solid.  I don’t think much about it.

Big mistake.

I’m reaching the limit.  I realized Sunday: I did not have time last week to read, except for student papers — and I have read every night of my life since I could read.

And yesterday, I realized I am starting to have grooming issues.  My fingernails look as if a woodland creature has been gnawing at them: they’re jagged, and half-covered in faded polish.  They are the fingernails of a frazzled woman.

What’s next?  Facial hair?  Howling at the moon?

But today’s revelation was by far the scariest, and it’s a first in my already half-way lived life: I’m more annoyed by my manicure deficit than by my lack of literature — like if I have to choose tonight, I’ll fix my nails and not read. What is that?  I adore reading.  What’s more, not reading in order to keep working could actually cause me to lose work, since I do comment on and review, um, what I read — and yet, I want pretty pink nails.  I want external order.

It seems I’ve given up on inner satisfaction.

So, you know what this means, right?  I’ve become a literary cliché!  The pace of modern life and the toiling nature of work in an industrialized society have alienated me from the very soul of culture.  Even my stress is irritatingly bookish.

It also means I’m taking a day off soon.