I feel like my brain has been a jumbled mess for the past few months. The AWW weekend was awesome and I was fired-up to get back into writing and other creative pursuits.
Then things sorta slipped away from me.
It started with our betta fish dying. May you rest in peace, Bob the Feared. The fact that I had been part of a team to keep this fish alive for 10 months was a big deal given that the last time I tried to take care of a fish, it died within 2 days. May you rest in peace, Jaws, and I am still sorry for overfeeding your fish, Jamie.
Then the much bigger event happened. My stepfather passed away. That was tough. He had been sick for quite some time and seemed to have just tanked this year. I was watching this unfold from more than a thousand miles away and felt completely helpless. Not that I could have done much if I was there, but still. You know what I mean. After he passed, there was an odd mix of emotions and it was interesting watching how other people reacted. I’d like to write more about that in its own post, but need to put a little more time between those events/observations and writing about them.
Then work got crazy busy, my personal life got crazy busy, and I got sick with a nasty cold and cough. In the midst of all of this, watching the news became increasingly depressing and social media started making me want to virtually slap people. All of this managed to work my brain into a massive tizzy, I feel worn out, and didn’t feel like I could think straight enough to put together words into sentences into paragraphs to make a blog post. And I didn’t like seeing that jumbled mess in my head.
So to combat this, I’ve backed off how often I read or listen to the news and how much I check social media. I’ve also gotten myself back into some creative pursuits, which has helped clear my head. I’m also trying to remember that I can’t control the people and events around me, but I can control my reactions to them. With that in mind, I’m paying better attention to where I spend my energy.
And starting on November 1, a lot of my energy will be going toward NaNoWriMo. The thought of it is a bit exhausting right now, but exciting at the same time. This will be my third year to participate. I won the last 2 years, so I feel hopeful about this year. The other exciting thing about this year is the story I’m writing is an idea from one of my sisters. We’ve had fun talking about it and I think it will be fun to write. And I might have to include something about the older sister killing the younger sister’s fish by accidentially overfeeding it. We’ll see.
Well, I feel better having just written a blog post for the first time in what seems like forever. I’m so silly. Why don’t I do this more often? I do know I probably won’t post much in November so I can save my words to go toward the 50,000 goal in NaNoWriMo, but I plan to be back to it shortly thereafter.