Speech!

About three weeks ago, I was in the car with Izzy and I mentioned an event at which I was going to be making a speech. She asked whether I'd started writing it yet and I replied no, as there were still seven weeks to go before I had to do it.

"Dad, it's on September 6th!".

Now, I don't make speeches as a rule. I had to do one earlier in the summer but up until now they haven't been a regular feature in my life. But the one for tonight was a biggie and it has been preying on my mind all summer. Anxieties about what I would write, about delivering it, about falling over as I walked to the lectern, about my trousers inexplicably falling down, you name it. And suddenly it was three weeks away, not seven!

But once the palpitations had passed, I realised this was a good thing. For a start, it meant four weeks less of a nagging worry and, also, I wouldn't have done anything during those four weeks, anyway, so I hadn't actually lost any time.

Unfortunately, I am one of those people who works best to a deadline, by which I mean I need the pressure of a deadline to get on with stuff. This is not a pleasant way to be. Yes, I get focussed by the deadline and, yes, by and large, what I produce is as good as I can make it but I hate it; the settling down to work only to distract myself with cups of tea, Twitter, ironing, a sudden burning desire to go to Wikipedia and find out more about whatever passes through my mind. Distraction upon distraction until suddenly there's no time for deviation; I have to knuckle down and get the thing done.

So, the following Thursday, I took the morning off, eternal optimist that I am, thinking that despite being two weeks away from the event, I might get something written. And I did! I bloody did! Yes, I popped onto Twitter once, but only to obtain a bit of arboreal knowledge, which was duly supplied by @quintinforbes and @lise_79. Hurrah for Twitter!

But by midday it was done. Oh, I knew it would need a bit of fine tuning, a bit of polish, but it was also good enough that I could have stood up there and then and used it. I sent it to a friend of mine, who gives great speeches, and also to @artminx and @twosoups, all of whom provided excellent feedback.

And from then on - up until Wednesday, at least - it was calm.*. No more fears of my chair tipping backwards off the stage or leaving a tag on my new suit, no concerns about a crook appearing from the curtains to drag me offstage. I was calm.

Which made me realise that all my anxiety had not been about speaking in front of a few hundred people or writing something worth reading out loud. No, it had arisen from my fear that I would end up writing the speech a few hours before I had to deliver it. I was scared of my own behaviour.

Will this experience change me? Have I learnt the pleasure of completing tasks in a timely manner? God, I'd love to think so. But for once my optimism is cautioned by a streak of realism. (Fingers crossed, though.)

*On Wednesday I found out I was also MCing.