So...

It's amazing how the weekend after a huge pity party, down on life fest, you unplug from the world and have an lovely weekend. One of those weekends to make you remember what's important. Who's important. What's right with the world. One of life's little tender mercies. We did a lot of yard work this weekend...a few things that needed done before the snow comes. I sat at my desk MAYBE a total of an hour for the entire four days. It was truly glorious. It was needed to replug into my life. Replug into my family. To remember.

In the old house, I had a lot of those moments...you know the ones that make you feel so content and that life is complete bliss? In the new house, though, not so much. I have been missing them completely. I'm sure it's due to trying to sell the old house and getting truly settled here, full of projects and to dos. But yesterday. Yesterday was glorious. Nothing special happened - it was full of cleaning the spiderwebs out, putting the fence up, putting down bricks for a walkway...But by mid afternoon I was overwhelmed by contentment. I felt life was good - is good - and right where it should be. There was something about working outside with Isaac, running errands, watching Sammy FINALLY learn to ride his bike that made everything ok. All my freak outs, my uncertainties, my insecurities, my concerns and questions about my career melted away. I was with my boys and nothing else mattered.

Or maybe it was the pending excitement over my newly purchased apple and nectarine trees...


(def leppard - hysteria)

Post Script...

I was going to put all of this in the comments and then it just started getting too long.

About the job. I KNOW I could get the job. I have no doubt in my heart that I could walk in there, rock that interview and get hired. My hesitance over it stems from other things: how this would affect my ability to mother Sammy in the way I want this last year before he goes to school, among them. However, this job feels like a step back, almost. I know it's not really a step back, but it feels that way. Or, maybe that isn't the right way to say it. It's almost like it took this opportunity to show me, or make me realize, and identify, my career goals. Journalism is a whole different beast than what it was when I was regularly seeing my by-line. And to go back to a daily isn't where I want to be right now. My focus has shifted and that's ok. If I took this job, I would be taking it just to take it and, especially this year, I wouldn't be able to focus on anything else, writing wise. I would after Sammy starts school, but not now.

As for the rest of the rant...what can I say? :) I have my whiny moments. Laurel's post really resonated with me and combined with sadness of friends, I felt overwhelmed. Luckily, by the time it posted yesterday, I snapped (mostly) out of it and had a plan. I guess I'm lucky that way. I rarely stay down for long without a plan. Plans are my drugs! It's how I cope and feel better and refocus. So consider me coped and better and refocused! You may not hear from me for a few days (Gotta finish outside...last weekend's snow in the mountains was quite the wake up call!) but the plan is there. We're good. Brain will always think too much, but it's usually only used for good and not evil, I swear!

Have a lovely Labor Day weekend, everyone...

And, Laura, I fixed that pesky "witty" thing, even though I REALLY doubt your lack of witty. :)


(half of everything, lloyd cole)

Should I Feel...

I went to bed with the weight of the world on my shoulders. I couldn't pinpoint the feeling; all was right in MY world, after all, so I wondered if it was a sense of foreboding. But it didn't feel like that, either. So I wondered if it was my choice of pre-bed reading material. A lot of bad news for blog friends across the board and I felt each of their sorrows acutely. To top it off, I reread Laurel's post and again, wondered why we're so hard on ourselves. Unfortunately, my mind was quick to answer: because I AM inadequate. Because I DO fail. Because...I'm NOT enough. Not matter what people think they see.

My personal inadequacy cycle is starting again. The point where I feel I'm:
- a horrible wife
- a terrible mother
- uneasy and unsure in my friendships

And then there is my writing...I'm feeling it's so terrible, maybe people are right; I am a hack who can't write! I declared to Isaac last week that I was a failure as a writer, that I would never call myself that again. I know there is an air of crazy to it all. That I wonder why my blog comments are down (even among my regulars), even though my readership is up. (Is it me? Do I offend? Do I not write anything interesting enough to comment on or, as Isaac suggests, do I write things that are closed-ended and not inviting to discussion? Do I use too few family stories / pictures? Too many? Write too little? Too much / often? And on and on and on...) It's to the point that even *I* miss my old posts. I miss that writer that just wrote the funny, the real, the stories. And if I think I'm being pedestrian and banal (oh, wait! Isn't that this post...?), what do others think? And finding time for my OTHER writing...there seems very few hours in the day to get it all done. So I either rush it in the snippets of time I can find or I wait until I have more time. Rock? Hard place? Me? Or, just complaining when I should be fixing? Because this inadequacy...it's good at making excuses and not focusing on solutions.

I woke up to a possible job opportunity. I don't know if I'll even pursue it. Actually, that's not true. I most likely won't. It's not where I want to go, ultimately. And, it's...complicated. And I was very, very torn. While lovely to hear that people think I should apply and try for it, I honestly didn't know what I would do. For every pro, there seemed to be one or two cons. But, with this weight...This weight is heavy and soiled with self pity, feeling as though I am failing at it all. So why should I try? Wading through that to get to the real was tough.

We have previous neighbors that seem, and very well may be, the perfect couple. I always wondered what, if any, fissures were beneath. The longer we lived by them, the more we saw the imperfections. Some that surprised us. And then I would wonder what people thought of us, of me, when they started looking hard enough. Beyond the "you're great" and "you're a great writer" comments. What would they actually see or say or wonder, if they started looking more closely. Would they see the failure? The inadequacy? Would the FINALLY sit back and say..."She's right. She isn't enough."?

I went to bed with the weight of the world. I woke up with the weight of my personal life. Most will right itself automatically. I'm not a terrible wife. I'm not a horrible mom. My friends are my friends are my friends. But the writing. That one seems to be sticking around longer and more intensely than normal. With the added flourish that something with my blog isn't connecting. And, despite having said it before, something needs to give. Something needs to move. Something needs to work. Be fixed or forgotten, once and for all. Because I may fail at a lot of things, but this failing is, for me, the most personal and would be the hardest to take. So I'm rooting for the be fixed option, but the inadequacy feels a little more wallowing may come first.


(forever live and die, omd)