for a while there, i needed to step away from the computer.
i think i just needed to step into my life a bit. really be present for my family and their needs without a screen in front of my face.
my children had been making comments. screen comments that involved me + that screen. the one i don't allow them to use very often. waldorf family that we are and all.
and they were right. i was planted in front of that screen fairly often.
i was loving the computer and it's endless possibilities a bit too much, perhaps. and then suddenly, my brain just needed a large break.
breaks are good.
i couldn't remember why i started blogging. i forgot. i wondered if it had any meaning. and so i paused with the blog writing and started scribbling on paper instead and i haven't stopped doing that. that's become a must for me. scribbling. on paper. downloading the things in my head that need to be scribbled and looked at by me only, so i could see what it is that my heart is really searching for and who i really am, what questions i have + what answers.
it's nice to check in.
i write in inexpensive spiral bound notebooks, so i don't get too precious about it, and i circle the things that seem to repeat themselves or that jump out at me for whatever reason, and i fold down the pages with the quotes i've copied that i love.
and i shred the rest.
i actually love that part. shredding those old thoughts and things of the past. letting go.
+ i love collecting the quotes that really resonate with me and making plans to embroider them on the latest thing i'm embroidering. i pencil them down on fabric. i hunt down just the right font, lover of font that i am, and trace it onto the fabric, hoping to duplicate it at least somewhat with thread.
but now i know exactly why i started blogging again. and i'll tell you.
it was that section in tif fussel's book that i got recently, that i love, where she talks about her own blogging experience and how it changed her perspective about daily life and helped her to see it in a different light + i thought oh my goodness yes. that's it. that's exactly it. that is what blogging does for me too. and photographing things. it changes my perspective about things. it helps me capture and remember + be present for moments in my life in a different way. it helps me see my life differently.
different meaning good.
for example, i am not an early riser sort of person. i do not have that gene. i just don't. i accept that about myself. some people i know can go out drinking until the wee hours of the night and they will still get up at five all bright and sun shiney, and clear their inbox and have breakfast made and clean the kitchen before the kids even get up.
that's just not who i am and i embrace that wholeheartedly and commend them on being the advanced human that they are who can do such impossible things.
i have never gotten over the fact that when i had children i had to shift my schedule to adjust to the hours they like to rise (and they are early risers) and as they've grown older to the hours they need to get to school or to that rehearsal or field trip or lesson on time, fed, lunches made, all that. all early.
i am cranky in the morning. i would never last long working on a farm or in a bakery, much as i find the idea romantic.
cranky.
partly because i would love to just sleep in until 7:30 and not 6 and also, probably because i love that quiet time at night so much, that time when the kids are asleep and the chores are either done or can be ignored and the phone stops ringing and i can just listen to the stillness and be creative and write or knit or spin yarn or paint or whatever without anyone interrupting me. i love that. i love it so much that i often get to bed far later than i should considering i have to get up at the crack of dawn to launch into the usual routine. and then i don't get enough sleep. and etc...
but. blogging + photography, and instagram lately, by the way. instagram.
now when my daughter and her beautiful sun-shiney friend come giggling into my room with cokatiels on their head at the crack of dawn after a very late night watching the mahler symphony, what do i do? do i scold them and pull the covers over my head, hoping to disappear back into that dream i was having, getting all ticked off that i can't??
why no!
amazingly, i feel a sudden, rare, impossible surge of adrenaline, RACE for my iphone and launch out of bed saying, "wait right there!" and "just a little to the left!" and start snapping away and instagramming and i suddenly i am filled with bliss. bliss. at not quite 7 in the morning. after going to bed after midnight! me. the cranky one. and i am ready to make those girls anything their hungry hearts desire. i am offering pancake-making and scrambled eggs and smiling as they bounce out of the room, chirping cockatiels in tow.
and then i look back at that photo later, several times, in fact, and i glow, thinking of that lovely, beautiful morning moment that i captured and appreciated and was truly present for. and i am happy. truly happy. whereas prior to blogging (which inspired + then drove me with some sort of incessant longing to the random capturing of daily life), i would have looked at that whole thing in a much more grumpy light. just the whole being woken up early after a late night thing. i would have completely missed the sweet giggly girls and the birds on both their heads and just all of the goodness of it.
crazy, right?
but i didn't miss it.
and i'm so glad i didn't miss it. i am so, so glad.
thank you tif + dottie angel, for pointing that out about blogging in your lovely book. because i had completely forgot. and now i remember. and i am very happy to be back.
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