Now that we've successfully completed our 365 song project, I've been reflecting on my experience of the past two years. One of the things that stands out for me doing a project where constant creation has a deadline, is how it became a fight against time.
We started 2007 with songs mostly complete through May - 5 months of songs. January 1 was the most comfortable I would be with our song calendar for the entire year. In February, we did the RPM Challenge which resulted in 13 new songs for The Song Of The Day and our new album All In A Day's Work, but the overall SOTD schedule slipped a bit. RPM took a lot out of me and I rested too much afterward and lost a little more ground. In the month of May, I wrapped up production for June - mastering and uploading the entire month in one big batch, which wasn't bad, but it seemed like a close call at the time. At this point, I started to feel like we were fighting the calendar. July was the same story - one big batch upload and still fighting the calendar. By the end of July, only half of August was done and the calendar fight intensified. Once late August hit, I was working week-by-week. Some weeks were touch-and-go, getting songs completed just a day or two before posting, and other weeks were easier - getting done in batches over the weekends. By the time October started, I felt like I was no longer fighting the calendar - I was fighting the clock. This fight intensified as the year wore on and from October through December, it was a race against the clock to the finish. On December 23rd, I uploaded Santa Don't Speak No Spanish at 11:57pm - only 3 minutes to spare. By the end of December I think I actually told someone that I hated clocks and I want to chuck them all out of my house!
This fight against the clock had its side effects. Clean laundry never got put away - it was always a big pile on the floor that I pulled from every day. I ended up paying some bills late - something I NEVER do because those late fees are such a screw. I didn't sleep much - a six hour night was a good night. Visiting friends and family was out of the question (aside from holidays, even though I REALLY could have used those holidays for song production!).
This all sounds really horrible. It wasn't. The experience of the project was the most worthwhile way I've ever spent a large chunk of my time. Would I repeat the experience and do a whole year of songs for a second time? Probably not. If I could go back, would I choose to do that first year again knowing what I know now? Absolutely! Plus, I did get a song out of this. I wrote I'm Fighting Time based on the theme of never having enough time to do all the things you really want. Contrary to what the song is about, somehow I did manage to find the time for this very challenging, extremely tiring, but fantastic project. It was worth every minute.
