It’s Saturday night and I’m finally sitting down to write to you, dear reader.
I have had a plethora of Start-Stops of what to say this week, but I found myself not quite sure of what I wanted to share. Between calls for more snacks or the usual, the boys and I have been cuddled up since they got here (and extras on a day off from school Friday). The air outside freezing and inside is warmer, but not as great as it could be which feels par for the course. Winter may have started back in December, but we are feeling the depths of what it really holds right now.
I’m tired in a way that only Winter brings out of me, the cold air can wipe me out: causing cold toes, drinking lots of tea or hot cocoa, hot baths, and trying to go for long walks when it’s sunny outside. I read “The Vaster Wilds” by Lauren Groff in one day while it was 16 degrees outside and my bedwarmer was working overtime. It felt like a luxury and also the only thing that I could do that day besides getting into a hot bath or convince myself that I could get up and make myself another hot bevvie. This week seemed to have speed by though, as if in fast forward— between the delayed school facetimes with A and the warp of days when it seems like the whole world is shutting down (nope, just Austin)— I feel like I slept my way through it or just lost track of it.
Winter, after all, is the season of rest and hibernation, nourishing yourself and day dreaming, why would I not feel like time doesn’t quite exist these days?
In between these lost days, I have poured my heart onto the page and I’m feeling like I’m out of words as I poetically try to lay a bit more of my heart out for you, dear reader.
I like to be all in on something, like let it consume me:
do all the writing prompts in one night,
pour my heart out until there is nothing left,
read all the books that strike my fancy.
A tell-tale sign that I am not into something is me half-assing it or not trying to be lovable.
This week while we had frozen temps, I embraced more creative endeavors. I started a new writing class with Brooklyn Writers Collective and met with my poetry group (Human is What We Are), read a book in one day as I mentioned and drank a lot of mushroom hot cocoa (your paid subscriptions are now funding this and coffee. Keep them coming!). New beginnings and creative potential feel so damn good right now and I’m beyond proud of myself for going after the things I have wanted to do for at least half my life, but I have to get the fantasy that I will be a “favorite student” or my “unique story telling” style will be praised, I need to let the dream of applause and appreciation die.
God, being human is ridiculous sometimes! I’m doing these things to learn, to expand my skills, and truly get intimate with words.
With new routines and rituals being made, the excuse to sit at my desk has felt organic as has my meditation practice again. I love it when one aspect of life has become more consistent, it feels a little easier to make the most of the others. I lie in bed most mornings, no longer scrolling, but breathing and visualizing my day//my life as I dream it is becoming. Something about being a student again (or perhaps it’s the recommitment to making life more poetic??) seems to be igniting the desire to lean into my rituals of self-care a little more. It feels necessary now to pause and breathe for a few minutes when I stoke the creative fires because I need the time to turn off all the “one liners” that come flooding in as new projects start. The meditations and coffee before I put pen to paper or finger tips to keyboard (even today as I peck this out, I took a few minutes) help to quiet any over thinking and get me clear.
All these words flowing from me, poetic notions of memories and day to day life, I can’t help but be grateful for the communities that hold me in their spaces so I can so freely share what exists in my heart.