Keep On Keepin' On

Yes, I know... I'm so pathetic. Right?

I've been spinning down from holiday mode and swept right back up into the year-end flurry of activity at work. The gray, cold days are getting to me. The kids don't seem to have caught up on their sleep yet because they are so crabby, confrontational, lazy, argumentative, ungrateful.... but enough of that.

I .... excuse me while I get my pot of tea...

I'm back now. Let me try this again...

I have forced myself to sit down today in front of the computer and start putting some words down in this little white square on my screen. I've thought about what I should be writing - usually on and off at work (during the flurry of activity). Typically, I jot down a few ideas a day on some scrap paper. Said scrap paper will get shoved into my bag at the end of my work day, taken home, taken back to work the next day in the same bag... and this process continues until I clean out my bag, usually once every couple of weeks. Then when I see the scrap of paper and the list of topic ideas that I had jotted at work I scrunch my nose, roll my eyes, shake my head and place the scrap in a pile of other "scrapped" ideas.

Why it's so hard for me to get an idea and run with it I couldn't tell you. I can come up with ideas, and as noted earlier, they usually come to me at times when I'm too busy to ponder on them for too long. I don't have time to quickly make an outline or begin developing a notion. Then when I see my topics later on, I'm usually much too brain dead to take the topic(s) and nurture them into an interesting post.

I do want to continue my extremely amateurish career as a blogger/writer. And I do want to be successful at it. My motivation has (momentarily, I hope) drained away. Coming home tired from work, and temporarily being the sole care-giver to the kids (as well as being the sole everything else), has really started taking its toll on me. And not to mention, but this is usually the time of year, after the Christmas tree and decorations are taken down, I start noticing how hum-drum my home looks. I begin pondering what it would look like with this changed or that changed, or this room rearranged, or a new one of those.... I've mentally begun my Spring cleaning list and can't seem to break free long enough to set my butt down and concentrate for 30 measly minutes.

It's a vicious cycle. Every year I plan to clean until I'm happy with what I have... but that means getting rid of so much stuff (like half of everything in the house). I intend to have the biggest and best and most well-organized garage sale ever.... said garage sale never seems to come to fruition. I intend to have my office cleaned up and organized so that when any and all W-2's and 1099's arrive in the mail I will be able to easily complete my income taxes and have them submitted to the IRS by the second week of February. I also intend to start planning a few extra items this year. For example, getting the house and back yard in ship-shape for my first-born's high school graduation party. Also, aforementioned first-born's Senior prom.

And there's just so, so much more...

But even so, I realize that these are things that almost everyone needs to deal with. And while I, quite normally, am feeling slightly incredibly overwhelmed by all of this, I'm willing to go back to that quiet space mentally prepared for myself a little over a year ago. That precious space where I am all alone (with the aide of some really good earbuds) and I can squeeze in a productive half-hour of writing time.

So I suppose it just boils down to getting reacquainted with my own goals: not the goals of my children, not the goals of the home - but my own personal goals. Hoping the kids won't kill each other when you shut the door and lock it, turn the music up really loud to drown out the arguing and say through the door: "Mom will be out in a little while."

You know they won't listen. You know there will probably be another broken or banged up something in the house. And you know that you're probably, as we speak, sprouting three more silver hairs (Lord knows I have). So I think the most important thing I can tell myself right now, is that it's okay to take time out for myself. That ever so precious me-time will be good for everyone in the house. Maybe, with some quiet time, my SHG (silver hair growth) will slow to a minimal pace. I'll let you know how that goes wink!).

Just for right now, I need to keep on keepin' on.