Housekeeping vs. Blogkeeping
It goes without saying that I haven't been writing so much this year. Good thing it goes without saying, then. Still, I say it to kick off this rare moment of actually writing something because I'm trying to fix the problem by first identifying the problem. I seem to be lacking something: Is it inspiration, or time?
Lately I've been feeling less breezy, less witty. When I peruse my most recent blog posts I find myself saying, "Man, have I gotten boring."
Today, however, I started off not by writing, but by reading. I was reading a few of my old posts, and because they were tailor-made for my own way of thinking, being from my very own brain, they got all those brain gears spinning anew. There I was, all set to write some new witty, amusing blog post...
And then I said, "just let me go push a screwdriver into my lawn first."
Yes, really. You see, I'd read some magazine article that said one way to check the health of your lawn is to see if you can easily push a screwdriver in to a depth of six inches. Yes, really, and you're not alone in thinking that borders on some kind of awesomely sophmoric joke, which, if I were my former, breezy, witty self, I could fashion for you now. But these days, it would seem I am nothing more than a boring old housewife, and I the only thing aroused was my interest in whether or not our lawn needed watering. How dull.
Maybe it's a little more outside the box, so to speak, to think of myself as a house-husband, because isn't lawn care the husband's domain? But, no, this tidbit was in Good Housekeeping, so it was clearly meant for me, the dutiful housekeeper, who, like most of the folks pictured on the magazine pages, is a woman. And for whatever reason I felt that I had to attend to the state of our lawn, so I dutifully went outside and conducted the test-measurements on the lawn's less-lush patches. They failed, but that's not really the point.
No, the point is, I read my old blog, I got all inspired, I opened the blog-posting page -
And then, staring at the blank screen, I said, "But first, let me go out and do that screwdriver test on my lawn!"
I seem to be a bit at war with myself these days. I suspect lurking behind all of it is midlifery; I'm midlifing all over the place. It's another chapter in the old story: Just who the hell do I want to be? Do I want to be a witty, breezy, but disorganized person, the sort of person who foregoes chores in favor of thinking out loud for her mostly own amusement? Do I want to regularly reflect on my life and how it's going, and mostly, Not Going? Or do I want to be proactive and practical, and refuse to sit down here until I've gone through the list? Laundry, check. Phone calls to schedule Things Of All Sorts, Check. Picking Up Around Here, Check. Belong to the Outside World, Check. And so on.
Try as I might, I just can't figure out how to do both.
It seems that these days whatever I do first sets the tone for everything else. Am I going to have a get-it-done day, or a bloggy day? I have to pick. Inertia, momentum, all that stuff seems to play a very large role in my behavior; I'm not good at switching gears, even after several hours, the time when most folks would need a break. No, if I stop, well, I'm stopping, dammit, and I'm not likely to return again any time soon.
Lately, I've been opting for the get-it-done. Which is working for me, but only up to a point. Just as having a long run of bloggy days works for me, but only up to a point. I can't sit here in the mess of my house for too long before it all gets to me, but the same goes for my brain. After a while you've just got to clean it out....
But where's the balance, what's the proper ratio? If I let the writing lie dormant for too long, it suffers. To write well, you've got to write frequently. Especially here, in this journalish format. Otherwise you spend half your time on the whole sorry-I-haven't-written business, which has got to be the most boring subject of all. Just get on with it, Susan!
I don't need to tell anybody that if you let the housekeeping go too long, everyone suffers.
So where am I at? I don't know. Right now I've got a lawn that needs watering, but supposedly the ideal time to water a lawn is first thing in the morning. Coincidentally, first thing in the morning is when the brain's language ability is highest. Yes, it's the perfect time for writing as well.
First thing in the morning I am usually asleep, not being a morning person.
And there you have it.
Lately I've been feeling less breezy, less witty. When I peruse my most recent blog posts I find myself saying, "Man, have I gotten boring."
Today, however, I started off not by writing, but by reading. I was reading a few of my old posts, and because they were tailor-made for my own way of thinking, being from my very own brain, they got all those brain gears spinning anew. There I was, all set to write some new witty, amusing blog post...
And then I said, "just let me go push a screwdriver into my lawn first."
Yes, really. You see, I'd read some magazine article that said one way to check the health of your lawn is to see if you can easily push a screwdriver in to a depth of six inches. Yes, really, and you're not alone in thinking that borders on some kind of awesomely sophmoric joke, which, if I were my former, breezy, witty self, I could fashion for you now. But these days, it would seem I am nothing more than a boring old housewife, and I the only thing aroused was my interest in whether or not our lawn needed watering. How dull.
Maybe it's a little more outside the box, so to speak, to think of myself as a house-husband, because isn't lawn care the husband's domain? But, no, this tidbit was in Good Housekeeping, so it was clearly meant for me, the dutiful housekeeper, who, like most of the folks pictured on the magazine pages, is a woman. And for whatever reason I felt that I had to attend to the state of our lawn, so I dutifully went outside and conducted the test-measurements on the lawn's less-lush patches. They failed, but that's not really the point.
No, the point is, I read my old blog, I got all inspired, I opened the blog-posting page -
And then, staring at the blank screen, I said, "But first, let me go out and do that screwdriver test on my lawn!"
I seem to be a bit at war with myself these days. I suspect lurking behind all of it is midlifery; I'm midlifing all over the place. It's another chapter in the old story: Just who the hell do I want to be? Do I want to be a witty, breezy, but disorganized person, the sort of person who foregoes chores in favor of thinking out loud for her mostly own amusement? Do I want to regularly reflect on my life and how it's going, and mostly, Not Going? Or do I want to be proactive and practical, and refuse to sit down here until I've gone through the list? Laundry, check. Phone calls to schedule Things Of All Sorts, Check. Picking Up Around Here, Check. Belong to the Outside World, Check. And so on.
Try as I might, I just can't figure out how to do both.
It seems that these days whatever I do first sets the tone for everything else. Am I going to have a get-it-done day, or a bloggy day? I have to pick. Inertia, momentum, all that stuff seems to play a very large role in my behavior; I'm not good at switching gears, even after several hours, the time when most folks would need a break. No, if I stop, well, I'm stopping, dammit, and I'm not likely to return again any time soon.
Lately, I've been opting for the get-it-done. Which is working for me, but only up to a point. Just as having a long run of bloggy days works for me, but only up to a point. I can't sit here in the mess of my house for too long before it all gets to me, but the same goes for my brain. After a while you've just got to clean it out....
But where's the balance, what's the proper ratio? If I let the writing lie dormant for too long, it suffers. To write well, you've got to write frequently. Especially here, in this journalish format. Otherwise you spend half your time on the whole sorry-I-haven't-written business, which has got to be the most boring subject of all. Just get on with it, Susan!
I don't need to tell anybody that if you let the housekeeping go too long, everyone suffers.
So where am I at? I don't know. Right now I've got a lawn that needs watering, but supposedly the ideal time to water a lawn is first thing in the morning. Coincidentally, first thing in the morning is when the brain's language ability is highest. Yes, it's the perfect time for writing as well.
First thing in the morning I am usually asleep, not being a morning person.
And there you have it.