In my many days of not-writing, I have come to believe that there’s no such thing as writer’s block. There is not knowing your plan, not being prepared, not doing your research, and not knowing the reasons for or the limits of what you need to do. Without these things, the writing becomes too big for the focus that the writing requires.
I am all of these things, and I’m also unable and partially unwilling to sit down with myself long enough to figure them out. I tell myself I’m just too honed-in on leaping over the skyscrapers in my way first, and by the time the days are done I am exhausted and sore and stretched to my limits. Maybe things will uncomplicate themselves soon and maybe they won’t.
In the meantime, here is a picture of a pond:
an early arrival
It’s hard to believe that a week that included something so beautiful — in February — could have been all that bad, but last week was so, so bad. I took a few emotional hits early in the week and by Wednesday night I’d pretty much given in. Thursday morning I let it all out; I cried shortly after waking up, I cried in the shower, I cried until I felt better. And then I threw myself head-first into a couple of projects, including a tiny pet project I’d been thinking about trying out for a few weeks.
Every Friday morning, we go out to breakfast as a family and I load up on high-octane coffee at the restaurant. And every Friday morning, when I sit down at my desk to work, the ideas fall out of my brain, moreso than any other day, littering my workflow with really bad ideas, really great ideas, and everything in-between. It’s got to be the coffee.
Whether or not I’m actually more productive on Fridays is debatable, but with so many ideas floating around, I probably forget and throw out so many ideas in these Friday sessions. Maybe these ideas wouldn’t be all that bad if they’d just somehow make it past the initial hurdle of self-criticism and lack of motivation.
Before I fueled up last Friday, I set up a text file on my phone specifically for jotting down ideas as I had them: ideas for work, ideas for this site, ideas for different posts, ideas for everything. The ideas spilled out fast and furiously until around noon, moving perhaps to more quality and less quantity as my workday came to a close.
I ended up with 16 pretty good ideas out of the whole thing. Looking over them now, I’m struck at the loss of every Friday’s coffee-induced brainstorms before. Why didn’t I do this sooner? And why didn’t I write down that I should figure out how to get some of that coffee at home every morning?
Olen loves to “play truck” — which involves running and pushing a large toy truck at high speeds across the house — and he often slams the truck into things purposely and accidentally. We’ve mapped out a path for him that involves the least amount of destruction at home, but it was actually no surprise when his school called to say he’d had a playground accident with a truck. (However, seeing the caller ID come up scared the crap out of me.)
High-speed Overlord + truck + mulch = pavement + face. He didn’t get scraped up that badly, just a little road rash above his lip and on his forehead. Plus he got lots of TLC during the clean-up process; he’s still talking about how they took him to the “kitchen” to “ice! ice!”.
As his wounds healed, the one on his forehead started to look like a little lightning bolt.
it's not going to scar.
So we gave him a black plastic drumstick and tried to get him to pretend it was a magic wand.
the overlord and the sorcerer's stone
(I am clearly not the paragon of timeliness here.)
We loved this sparkly Valentine heart, even if it shed glitter all over the house. I have found glitter in Olen’s bed, in his diaper, on my toothbrush, under the kitchen table, all over my car, on the staircase, and stuck to the bathroom mirror. I’m sure I’ll find more. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a small price to pay.
Love is: glitter. Everywhere.
My husband gave me an seriously wonderful Valentine’s Day present this year. (He’s been really killing it with the gifts lately, my birthday and Christmas were some of my favorites for sure.) And there were flowers and chocolates too, but to be able to write about his gift in the way that it deserves… I just need a little time, dear reader. Until then, I’ll leave you with this: it was thoughtful and romantic and absolutely perfect.
Dare I say it? Life-changing.
I don’t know how I missed this earlier, but a couple weeks ago Formulists announced they were shutting down. This is such a bummer to me: among other lists I’d created, I had spent a lot of hours and brainpower in late 2010 to create an auto-updating list of Columbia MD twitter people and while I don’t always have time to read it every day, I have loved being able to check the list stream during major local events (like Wine in the Woods, weird traffic snarls, or a freak snowstorm) and I’ve also met a ton of great local people to follow.
While the list still exists in my account, it doesn’t auto-update anymore, and that’s what was really awesome about Formulists. I’ve already seen a few people who have moved away from Columbia who are still listed; in the past with Formulists, they would have been dropped from the list automatically once they changed their location. Now that Formulists is gone, I have to do it manually when and if I find their location has changed.
Pain. In. The. Ass.
I also really loved my “where my friends at” list — generated by Formulists to list who talked with the people I talked with — it was an easy way to break the ice. The list description said “you talk with my friends. maybe we should be friends too? follow me @allura.” (I’m not a first-step taker, but I am always happy to meet new people.) And as corny as it was, a lot of really awesome people followed me, people I am so very glad to know now.
I really wish I’d not gotten wrapped up in work and life and all of the things that kept me from purchasing a pro-level account with Formulists last year. I’m not deluded enough to think that my personal purchase would have made an overall difference, but it’s worth noting that I wanted to buy and just didn’t. Maybe the problem was that I could actually run all of my awesome lists for a year and never felt pressure enough to up my free account to a paid one. Too bad I don’t have the option any more — the pressure is on now and I’d pay today to get my lists auto-updating again.
I hope someone, somewhere takes it upon themselves to work the list-creation, list-merging, and auto-updating features of Formulists into a solid product soon. It’s something I’d pay for — almost immediately this time.
Olen’s still mastering his name. If we ask him what his name is, he says “Oh-no”, which is so cute it just reduces me to a puddle of goopy goo. Close enough, kid. (And if you correct him, I might stab you.)
He’s started singing a lot this past week — not just singing along with things or hitting the last word of every rhyme, but actual unprovoked singing and instrument playing throughout the day. So when he sings “Happy Birthday” while banging on his xylophone or our piano, he sings “Happy Birthday Oh-no! Happy Birthday to Oh-no!”
…
One of the ways we prepared Olen to go to preschool was by practicing separation at the house beforehand. I’d go to my office in the basement and tell him I had to go to work while he got to play with Dad. He got so used to saying goodbye for me to go to work at home that it was almost tear-free at school. Almost.
The other day on the way home from school he was chattering about his day. “School! Mama has to work day! Kids take a nap! Mama back real soon!” I always wonder what he thinks I do while he’s at school (or while he naps, even) so I just asked.
He responded, “Mama have work!”
“Yes, okay. What does Mama do for work?”
“Mama put away the work.”
Okay then. I think I’ll try asking again later.
…
We have always had the habit of eating out several times a week. As a result, Olen is usually really well-behaved in restaurants. I emphasize usually, because lately he’s started freaking out when the food comes to the table, grabbing and screeching and flailing arms. It’s like he’s doing his best impression of a monkey hopped up on goofballs — and it’d be pretty comical, if it weren’t for all of the weird judgy stares. So, we started talking to him in the car beforehand about how we behave in restaurants, really emphasizing that he’s not to grab food (which could be — and often is — hot), keep his volume down, et cetera.
The other day we were driving all around running errands and as we passed by one of the restaurants we frequent, Olen shouts from the backseat “No grab food! No screaming! No crying!”
Well, as long as our expectations are clear!
…
The last step of Olen’s bedtime routine is a backrub when he gets in bed. Ideally one of us would rub his back for a few minutes and then kiss him goodnight and leave, but he’s just not ready for that yet so sometimes the backrub part can last forever. I can always tell when he’s really close to falling asleep because he always makes a final request. Often, it’s asking me to rub his back — in true Overlord fashion –while I’m rubbing his back. “Rubba back,” the sleepy voice says. “Rubba baaaaaaaaack.”