I noticed the leaves changing today. Well, I noticed first yesterday but it was so little I imagined I imagined it. Today, I’m seeing it all over. Not on every tree but enough to indicate clearly that the beginning of the end has begun. I’m desperatly hanging on the thr hope that though the days are growing shorter and cooler it will be a long while more before I feel trapped and hopeless in winter again.
Two of my sisters, born years apart, one to a different mother and the other from a different father, celebrate their birthdays today. I called them both, one too tired to talk much and the other, well, in that case I was the one too tired to talk much. I haven’t been myself today. Either the fatigue is back or I am coming down with something. Everyone at work is sick and so are many of the kids. I hear it’s strep which I have always been susceptible too.
A larger part of me is convinced it’s all in my head.
The morning started out well but I’m feeling rather unnerved and I can’t figure out why. Everything is good. I’m on time. I’m relaxed. I’m getting shit done. I guess the reasons I should be feeling good are exactly the reasons I’m so worried. I’m not used to this feeling.
After the doctors visit yesterday I picked up a bottle of magnesium gel caps with the hope of not only improving my ulcerative colitis symptoms but of aiding in my quest for a good night’s sleep too. I took just one with dinner and—I know it’s probably all in my head but—I really feel like I slept better last night and got up right on time to go for a short jog this morning with no issue.
Last night I wasn’t able to get my body weight routine in, but, oh well, I’ll try again tomorrow evening. I may go out running again to make up some of the time and distance lost on my morning run to sidewalk closures this evening, but if I don’t, it’s fine too. I deserve the rest anyway.
René Magritte, Le Seize Septembre, 1956
“I have just painted the moon on a tree in the blue-gray colors of evening. [Poet Louis] Scutenair has come up with a very beautiful title: Le seize septembre. I think it ‘fits,’ so from September 16th on, we’ll call it done.”
— Rene Magritte, Magritte: The True Art of Painting (via Austin Kleon)
I somehow have my shit together today and it’s kind of freaking me out. I arrived at work early, didn’t forget anything, had very little anxiety, and have managed to carve out a couple of hours of free time for myself. Later this afternoon I have a doctor’s appointment and consequently the afternoon off from work. I’m looking forward to both without stress or guilt. Who am I today?
Update: The doctor’s visit went really well. Starting tomorrow I will start tapering off of one of my medications entirely and in the next few months I will get to drop to a lower dose of the other. I can stop taking the iron supplements, but I have to keep taking the calcium and vitamin D and I have to add magnesium. More blood was drawn and soon I will need bone density and skin checks but it’s all just precaution.
My lab results are good. I feel good, and I have the best doctor and support system anyone could have asked for.
Write one new thing outside of my journal. I don’t have to post it this week, but I do have to write something, anything. I have a schedule and I have to stick to it. That means no social media, no “research”, no work duties and no minor chores. Just keep it simple. Write it, even if it’s bad, even if you don’t even know what it is, just write it.
Update: Yeah, no, I didn’t get this one done. I was just too distracted. I was too full of energy and longed too much to be outside and moving.
Read 200 pages of anything. I have 3 books going right now and I have made very little progress on any of the three. I think it would be best if I narrowed the options to two—one physical book and one to read from my phone. Progress will feel more substantial and fewer choices make it easier to decide when and what to read.
Update: I’m not sure how many pages I read but I’m guessing off the top of my head around 100. It’s better than nothing at all but I had hoped for better. Once again, it was an issue of focus, not time.Update:
Finish week five of MODPO. It’s been months since I’ve done a lesson and all I have to do is watch the videos. It’s hard because I have to devote my full attention to the lesson but it’ll be good practice as I move away from multi-tasking anyway.
Update: This I completed and made quite a lot of progress toward finishing week 6 too. I could have gotten that done too, but I picked up where I’d left off on International Women’s Health and Human Rights too.
Wake up early to go for a run three mornings this week and choose three other evenings to do a simple body weight work out instead. On Sunday go for hiking and a do a simple yoga routine. The goal is not to push myself but just to start. Any activity at all will be better than what I have been doing.
Update: I did the running but was too busy and too tired in the evening for the bodyweight routine. On Sunday I was nursing a sore knee and decided it was best to stay in.
Go to bed on time. I haven’t been sleeping well, and it’s starting to affect my mood and my motivation. I want to get back to getting ready for bed 30 minutes beforehand and if I get done early, reading a physical book until I feel drowsy.
Update: I sort of did this. I wasn’t always on time but I wasn’t late either so I’ll call it a win. Where I failed was, I didn’t read before bed and so by the time I had torn myself from my phone screen I wasn’t in the right headspace to rest. I’ve reset the “head to bed” alarm on my phone and with the cooler evening on the way a hot cup of Sleepytime tea will be further incentive.
Breakfast for the week is overnight oats. It’s cheaper than buying instant oats and probably healthier too but I have to remember to make them, every night! While I’m choosing the healthier option I should also refrain from buying snacks or dipping into the candy bowls at work. I never feel good after indulging.
Update: I did really well making the oats every night and doing so has saved me so much time in the mornings that there’s no way that I can go back to making breakfast in the morning again.
Catch up on the work thing I’ve been avoiding for the last few weeks now. I’m just feeling insecure but the truth is I am doing a good job and even if I do end up making a mistake or messing it up entirely, no one will be mad and I’ll learn and do better going forward.
Update: This is my biggest failure of the week. My excuse is the lack of hours but the reality is I’m still just overthinking it.
I know the list is long but if I stay positive and focused; I know I can do it. There are enough hours in the day, and on the days that there aren’t, I’ll choose just one thing to accomplish and rest assured that it is enough.
I cleaned. I wrote a little. I didn’t get to that cut out poem, but I spent some time on taking care of me. There was a delicious dinner and a bottle of good red wine. I got new head phones and they are exactly what I need to help get through the long days at work.
And now the weekend is over and I am trying not to be too down about it. I’m proud of myself for doing better today than I did yesterday but I’m still carrying so much guilt. I can’t do that anymore. I can’t let myself get sucked into mindless TV and social media timelines that way again. Not all day.
But today was better, and that has to be enough. I have to let it go and start new tomorrow.
Hello dear readers! Happy Sunday and welcome. Thank you for stopping by for a bit of caffeine and catching up.
I’m up later than I hoped and very short on energy or perhaps motivation and passion are what I’m lacking. I’m like a zombie, up and moving but not motivated by much. No food looks good, nothing much sounds fun, even the idea of coffee is turning my stomach a bit, but I think the best way to crawl out of this funk is to do exactly all of those things that sound so hard to do right now. That means opening the curtains and letting the sun in, making breakfast, pouring a big cup of coffee and chatting with you. I know that’s what I need, even if my mind is right now trying to convince me otherwise.
Please, pull up a chair and fill up a cup. Summer seemed on her way out last week but today she has returned as strong as ever. I don’t mind though. I know once she makes way for autumn proper I’ll be miserable until spring. So today the widows are open to let the day’s heat waft in and warm the soul and we have a full carafe of cold brew already steeped. Let’s talk about last week!
“The early morning is too strong to drink straight, so I need to mix in a little coffee to be able to hold it down.”
— Jarod Kintz, This Book Has No Title
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that lately I have not been feeling great, either mentally or physically.
I’m pushing through though but struggling to balance the need to rest, to take it easy and to keep my stress levels low with the guilt of not working as much as I want to and the thrill of helping people, being important, respected, and part of something greater than myself.
I haven’t been mindful of the way I spend my time lately. I get caught up in the immediate and lose sight of my goals. The problem is, it’s easier to complete tasks at work than it is to write. So, this week I have a strict schedule with strict times for working and strict times for stopping. I have times for writing, and reading, and for when to watch TV and when not to. I’m trying to have faith in myself but I have a feeling the schedule will fall apart by mid-Monday.
The key to planning is not just what you write on paper or put in your calendar but how you prepare emotionally and I can tell you emotionally I am already in an anxious and avoident state. I already don’t want to do anything at all.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that outside of work things have been quiet, a nice change from last week when things were not so much hectic as they were incredibly worrying.
I can’t get into it all because not all of it is mine to share but I will just say that being the oldest daughter in the family is hard. I feel responsible not only for all my younger siblings but for my parents too and quite unexpectedly the feeling only grows as we all get older. Half of my poor moods and cruddy feelings have to do with lack of sleep and energy spent on worry, worry, worry. I’m constantly trying to work out schemes and solutions to all their problems and at the end of the day I collapse into self-pity and worthlessness when I can’t fix all their problems.
It’s hard, but it isn’t all bad. I love my family and I truly feel honored to be looked to as not only a good example but as a source of knowledge and a comfort. I don’t feel resentful. I just wish there was more I could do.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I’ve been especially down and lazy all weekend. I had planned to go hiking this morning, but I never got my gear together and anyway, I stayed in bed far too late to go. I binged an entire season of a show all day yesterday and ate nothing but junk. I barely wrote anything, and I didn’t make any reading progress.
But, I am determined to turn the weekend around today. I’ve spent our whole chat telling you how bad things are but I have hope. Already today I have gotten so much cleaning done around the house and rather than spending my time on the couch I’m at my desk in my “creativity room” writing and catching up on my favorite podcasts, things I enjoy, things that make me feel better.
On my to-do list for the day is to finish this post, finish the housework, and then, to make something. I’ve been missing the meditative process of making cut out and cut up poems and I have been wanting for a long time to make some collage art too. I have a corner piled high with magazines and a tray of cut out scraps on the desk. I have new X-Acto blades and a new set of wireless headphone to tune the world out with.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that this coming week will probably be a busy one. I have a doctor’s appointment this week to talk about my medicine dosages. I’ve been rushing back and forth from the lab and talking with pharmacy techs over the phone and it turns out the dose I am on come with significant risks. My doctor would like to see how I do on a lower dose since I have been stable and in remission for close to a year now, a course of action I fully support.
We have a new class of employees starting and although I am not scheduled to train them this week; I have a bad feeling I’ll be saddled with the work nonetheless. The bright side is I am in the market for a few hours a week of overtime and very willing to work if they are willing to pay.
This week my wife and I are also celebrating the birthdays of four family members between us, three of which are my siblings. My father-in-law and one of my brothers share one day, and two of my sisters, born years apart and to two different mothers, share another. We’ll be doing our best to get meaningful gifts in time and to spend time with the ones we can before the start of next week.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I am honestly feeing better already. Just getting everything off of my chest, and consuming two cups of cold brew, have definitely done the trick. I’d love to keep chatting but I think I’ve complained enough and I fear I I’ll find very little else good to say.
I hope you had a good week. I hope that wherever you are summer is hanging on and that you are able to find time to get out and enjoy the last of it. I hope you were able to accomplish something big and if you weren’t I hope you know you can always get up and try again. I hope you are taking care of you.
Thank you for chatting, for being an ear, a shoulder, and a sounding board.
Until next time.
Written for the #WeekendCoffeeShare link-up hosted by Eclectic Alli.
It’s been a lazy day spent binge-watching mindless shows, napping, drinking hard ciders, and eating junk. My body hurts and my mood is spoiled. Everything that would help sounds exhausting. There is no hope to recover the day, not that I want to anyway.
Happy Saturday everyone! If you’re looking for some interesting things to read and see while you kick back and relax, look no further, here is the best from around the web this week, according to me.
1. “What you do is you keep all of your passions at play in your life. So, if there are three things that you love more than anything in this world you spend time on those three things and then they start to talk to each other and that’s when your life begins to form.” — Austin Kleon // SXSW interview with Debbie Millman
2. “Think of the world’s Five Big Problems. Climate change, mass extinction, inequality, stagnation, and extremism. The money that’s piled up in the hands of richest 1% of the richest 10% of people on earth should be used to solve those problems. In a very real sense, those problems are just different names for ‘too much money piling up in too few hands.’” — umair haque // (How) Capitalism Turned Life, the Planet, and Civilization into Money — and Our Challenge is Turning it Back
3. “Do It; You Can Always Apologise Later.” and other rules for radicals.
4. “But we have a solution. We decided to be irreverent to this idea that only lawyers can impact the courts. And to penetrate the judicial system with the power, intellect and ingenuity of community organizing. We call the approach ‘participatory defense.’” — Raj Jayadev // TEDxBinghamtonUniversity
5. “People look at my story and applaud me and wonder what I did to ‘beat the odds.’ I wish they were more curious about why my brother did not. I wish they would ask, ‘What trap lay before this talented, bright boy so that he was bound to fall into it?’” — Akintunde Ahmad // I Went to Yale. My Brother Went to Prison
6. “The claim of democracy doesn’t negate meritocracy, but they’re in tension. One values equality and openness, the other achievement and security. Neither can answer every need. To lose sight of either makes life poorer. The essential task is to bring meritocracy and democracy into a relation where they can coexist and even flourish.” — George Packer // When the Culture War Comes for the Kids
8. “What did they want? More than anything? Violent things. Unattainable things.” — Courtney Zoffness // Hot for Teacher
9. “But unfortunately the embarrassing message has already been received, and probably wedged deep into her teenage brain: there are always going to be people leering at parts of your body that you may not even be thinking about.” — Hannah Smothers // An Adult Pointing out Exposed Parts of Your Body Can Haunt You For a Lifetime
10. “This is all to say that the closer I look at the evidence regarding how our brains function, the more I’m convinced that we’re designed to be single-threaded, working on things one at a time, waiting to reach a natural stopping point before moving on to what’s next.” — Cal Newport // Our Brains Are Not Multi-Threaded
11. “This September, millions of us will walk out of our workplaces and homes to join young climate strikers on the streets and demand an end to the age of fossil fuels.”
12. “We have this affinity toward animals that are closer to us. We want to protect them. And the closer they are to us, the more we say that they must feel pain — that they’re worthy of protection. And the further they are evolutionary from us, the easier it is to morally excuse abuse of them.” — Leah Garcés // Battle-tested lessons from the animal rights struggle
13. Throwback: “In the most photographed and videotaped day in the history of the world, the images of people jumping were the only images that became, by consensus, taboo—the only images from which Americans were proud to avert their eyes.” — Tom Junod // The Falling Man
Have you read, watched, written, or posted an interesting or inspiring thing this week? Has something on the internet made you feel strongly, think deeply, or see the world in a new light? If so, drop a link in the comments, we’d love to check it out!
Write one new thing outside of my journal. I don’t have to post it this week, but I do have to write something, anything. I have a schedule and I have to stick to it. That means no social media, no “research”, no work duties and no minor chores. Just keep it simple. Write it, even if it’s bad, even if you don’t even know what it is, just write it.
Read 200 pages of anything. I have 
Lisa Marie Blair 