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A place to exercise my mind and build my writing skills, I hope. |
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I'm returning to writing after a long self-imposed hiatus, which can mostly be attributed to laziness. Finding this site has made me feel like I've come "home." It is so comforting and reassuring to know that spelling and grammar are still important and valued. At work I am consistently exposed to intelligent people who write and spell like uneducated "hicks" - and no one seems to care. Some are so bad that I am baffled as to how they obtained their degrees and licenses. I am relieved to know that our entire society hasn't abandoned good writing practice. Please, never hesitate to point out any typos, misspellings or grammar errors to me, I welcome it! One of my goals this year is to make time for writing. I thought that writing a blog may better help me to work toward achieving this, since essays and stories are far more time-consuming. I'm not sure when I started to feel that there was never enough time to do much outside of my day job. I hope to overcome that obstacle in the near future because it's rather depressing. My goal is to making blogging a daily habit so that I don't lose touch with my writing again. Thanks for reading. |
| No one knows better than I do how lazy I've become over the past several years. After years of struggling to live an active life despite health problems, I developed another one that finally brought me to my knees. Well, actually, it knocked me out cold and I've allowed myself to live in a literal state of unconsciousness for the past few years. There is a difference between settling for and accepting what life gives us. When we settle, we resign ourselves to living with the condition and not trying to move beyond it. Accepting means that we face it head on and continue to work toward overcoming it. I've allowed myself to get into some very bad habits over that time. While I did need to slow down and listen to my body more, I did not have to become complacent and use my health as a reason to fail to complete things, be late most of the time or just plain not do what I needed to do at all. "I can have a full time job or I can have a clean house, but not both" became justification for my excuses. Last night I proved to myself that I can indeed do what I need or really want to do with very little effort. Over this past weekend, I wanted to write. I had a short story in progress for one of the contests. I do not normally write fiction. I've been trying the prompts and the first piece I wrote was a lot of fun. I decided to try it again for a contest with a prompt. I planned to finish it this past weekend but there were several obstacles. First, on Saturday morning we needed to have the telephone company come and check out why the phone was full of static and why our high speed internet was acting like dial up. I could not get online for a good part of the day. Second, the day before, my wrists and arms began to swell up and itch and by Saturday morning swelling and red welts were all over my body. My forearms looked like Popeye the Sailor Man. Since this had never happened to me before, I decided to go to Urgent Care although there was an extra charge for coming in on the weekend. That was a surprise because I thought that's what they were there for. It turned out to be an allergic reaction to something I had eaten. I do not have food allergies that I know of and the cause is not yet known. Despite having a shot and a prescription, it took 24 hours for the swelling to go down and I am still itching - and not sleeping because of it. The trip to Urgent Care involved several hours that I had not budgeted for in my schedule. Third, we had high winds on Sunday that kept knocking the power out, so I was afraid to have the computer on and put it at risk of frying due to a power surge. Fourth, after work on Monday I came home and did laundry and the floors besides taking care of my two dogs and two cats, and relaxed the rest of the evening, telling myself I could finish the story tomorrow. Fifth, yesterday was an even worse day at work and I worked four hours overtime. Even though I knew that I didn't have enough time to do a proper job, I did want to get the story in. Plus, I still had to figure out how to do a bitem link since this is my first contest submission. The deadline was at 11:59 p.m. and I got it submitted at 11:58 p.m.! I'm not concerned with winning anything. I just wanted to prove to myself that I could finish the story, and a review would be a bonus although I know that it could be much better, especially the ending. But the point is that I got it done. Another excuse disguised as a justification that I have used is that if I can't do it right, I shouldn't do it at all. This may work in other areas of my life, but unless it's a paying job I can probably get around this one with my writing. Apparently I have proven to myself that if I really want to complete something, I can and will do it no matter what obstacles are in the way. I wanted to blog this morning and didn't get up early enough. I'm on my lunch break at work right now, watching my excuses float out of the window. |
| On my way to work yesterday, just ahead of me in the sky was a flock of geese flying in a perfect "V" formation. They separated and came back together several times. They looked as though they were having fun, spreading out their wings and soaring. As soon as I could, I looked up the meaning of the Goose as a Native American Animal Totem. For those who are not familiar with totems, many Native American and other tribes look upon the symbolism of animals as lessons from the Creator. In some tribes, it is called "animal medicine." It is believed that when you have a lesson to learn, that animal will keep appearing until you have taken action to learn it. These are considered "message totems." There are also "journey totems," which are the "animal medicine" that a person carries with them throughout their life. I found it very interesting and exciting when I learned that Goose symbolizes: A belief in stories and legends Communication, especially with the written word Loyalty and Fidelity Eating vegetables (one of my resolutions is to eat a healthier diet) and that Their honking speaks of fulfilled promises that great adventures bring. I'm so encouraged by this symbolism. I've just recently returned to writing and I'm also embarking on a scary, but exciting, new project at work. I dug out Christina Aguilera's CD, "Stripped" to listen to on the way to work this morning. It's a fabulous collection that also includes her songs "Fighter" and "Beautiful." But the one that I'm going to hang on to as my mantra for today is "Soar:" "Don't wait, no more, Spread your wings and soar" So, what are YOU waiting for? |
| Goals are on our minds right now and probably will be for at least the rest of the month, when we'll either pat ourselves on the back or give up. Driving home from work last night, I realized that I just might need to treat myself like a recovering addict or a little kid and structure my life by making - oh horrors! - lists and schedules. Although I do like routine, I've never been one to set up my days or tasks on an exact schedule. I wing it loosely by the clock and the calendar and if it gets done, great. If not, oh well. Usually. I don't like making lists. Besides, it seems any time that I've made a shopping list I've found more than a few laughing at me from the kitchen table when I get home from the store, because I forgot to bring it. I've tried doing the list thing. It didn't give me the highly touted "gratification buzz" when I crossed something off. In my profession as a social worker where I work with people and crisis, every schedule is subject to change at a moment's notice, so maybe that was another factor in my resistance to lists. With a deep sigh, I'm admitting that I am going to have to resort to lists and schedules if I truly want to set and accomplish my goals this year. Maybe that's why I bought five planners over the past month or so? |
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