The typical response to that type of title should be, “No shit!” But, hear me out. I have a problem. Well, dozens. And I know what they are. At least, most of them. The problem is when I’m in the act of committing a problem, it doesn’t seem like a problem. Even though I knew before and after that it is. With me now?
I’ve been running my hurricane website for years. Little BG: it started in 2004 as an online desktop app. I was consistently in the top three for downloads on Download.com. Why? I have no fucking clue cause I hardly ever used it. But, people tried it. Some liked it. Many bought it.
It was a piece of shit. It took several minutes to update data. And that’s if you ran the program on a regular basis. I was new to the language so to expect a work of art would be uncalled for. But, I realized after the ‘04 hurricane season I needed to go online. I had a plan. It wasn’t written. It was in my head. This bitch was going to be Off. The. Chain!
Here’s where the problems came in. I’m a perfectionist. I’ve been told I suffer obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) ( I don’t repeatedly shower or fold clothes or clean or any of that crap). I’ve never been officially diagnosed. I’ve also been told I suffer from attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Again, never officially diagnosed. Some would say I’m just lazy.
Pick a number between one and three. Whichever one you pick, you’ll most likely be correct.
When I started building the hurricane website I knew what I wanted to do. Some of the online tools you see now for tracking hurricanes with the interactive maps – I thought of that shit back then. Problem was, I didn’t have the resources of a Google to do the mapping. I had to hand-code it all. I didn’t know how.
This is where the problems would come in. I would sit down and study. Flash. Javascript. I would literally find examples, source code and tutorials on zooming, panning and loading maps with my hurricane data. I’d start writing the code. I’d test it. I’d test it. I’d test it.
Over and over and over again.
Then, when I was done testing it, I’d design it. And I’d design it. And I’d design it.
To put it in a better analogy, imagine I was trying to build a house. I’d lay the foundation. I’d frame it. Then I’d pick a bedroom, start sheet-rocking it. Texture it. Paint it. And move furniture into it. And I’d keep rearranging that furniture until I got it just how I wanted it. Then when I’d realize I still had the rest of the house to sheet-rock, paint and decorate, I’d move on to another room to repeat the process.
But, something about that first room would bug me. Something. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly. So, even if I had been half-way through working another room, I’d go back to the first and start jacking with it again. But, by this time I was no longer happy with how it looked. Not just the furniture, but the paint color, the style of texture. Hell, I didn’t even like that there was six inches less width in this room than the other room.
So I’d tear it down. The whole fucking thing. Tear it down to the frame.
Build. Destroy. Repeat. Every. Fucking. Time.
Perfectionist. Regardless of what disorder I may or may not have, the frustrating thing is knowing what I need to do and sticking to it. I have great ideas. And once I get on a roll, it’s hard to stop. But, I don’t program much right now. I don’t design (which is why this site is so bland – not that I haven’t worked on it, but I’m never happy with the results).
I’ve considered medication. Something to ease my thoughts or to help me streamline them. Perhaps someday I will. Perhaps soon. Looking back on the last ten years I know I would be much better off had I been able to control my ideas and thoughts better.
The thing is: I know that until dramatic changes are made, the problems will continue to repeat. Maybe tomorrow morning, they won’t seem like problems anymore.
Build. Destroy. Repeat.
