…a pause.
There was always a time of year I was desperately excited for. “School is back in session” is and was always a favourite phrase. I was one of those kids who was titillated over the prospect of hundreds of euros worth of new school books that my mother would stay up till 2am laminating the covers of. In particular, you could not keep me away from a gleaming, crisp new refill pad or lined copy book, the spine not yet cracked. Shopping for new uniforms even if they weren’t mine own? Oh you bet I would volunteer always to accompany. Suggest a new schoolbag to me (which being one of seven children was a ‘once every 5 years or so’ situation) and I could hardly stop wandering into my daydreams about how scholastic my life would be henceforth. In essence I was a total knob. Some may even say I was a dork. Here in my middling thirties, I embrace it. I was a nerd but not the cool type of nerd who we are familiar with nowadays. No no, my nerdship was of a far more embarrassing, pathetic kind. Much of it came from a desire to feel like I was working towards something meaningful. Summer historically had been a difficult time for me as without learning I would become far too introspective for my own good. Case in point, this website is basically me just thought spiraling publicly. I believe this is why I just can’t let go of learning.
School time is such a sweet return to routine, ritual and reflection as we process the goodbye to our feckless summer selves and say hello to our autumn loving goblins just waiting to take over and make us all nostalgic and productive for a time. It’s how I have always felt, that is until this past school semester in which I was beaten bloody by my own delusions of my capacity. I have been humbled, to say the least, by the sheer exhaustion of going ‘back to college’ in the stage of life I am in, in particular in a masters degree of such brilliant and intense commitment. Lord have mercy, I was one arrogant fool thinking I could simply sashay back into college no problem, and I am learning that I have to start being honest with myself and others about how I can truly show up in this world. Some of my most beloved activities/hobbies took a backseat without conscious effort and this website was one of them. If you are still here I thank you, if not well you likely weren’t here in the first place because I have like six readers so I bid you a joyful farewell.
Graduate school + full time work + mumming has taken precedence in my days and it has to become ok right now or I will not mentally survive this season. I tell myself when I miss all my ‘downtime’, the other little bonus extra good things in life are always waiting to be picked back up. Investing in my dreams means there are years of dreaming and years of doing and the doing may not always be fun but it is moving me forward. Maybe for some of you this can be a helpful thing to read. Hard seasons come and go and if you are in the hard season no matter if it’s like mine or something entirely different, just know you are in it with oh so many other people. It sucks and it’s boring and it’s totally ok to resent the people who are seemingly in the good times. Plus there can be tiny glimmers of joy in the tension, here is a shortlist:
a toddler hand stroking your ear and murmuring to themselves “wow mommy ring so pretty” and cupping your face in her teeny little stubby fingers
a stranger saying “thank you for letting me pet your dog mine died last month and I have just been so sad”
a group of kids cheering when you kick a soccer ball back to them
lying down on the grass watching red and gold tree tops gently blowing in the wind
the PERFECT hot chocolate with marshmallows AND whipped cream after a chilly day outside
a friend you thought had their shit together saying, “me too”, when you muster up the courage to say “I don’t know how to keep going on or if I can…”
Tiny things, transformative things, the things I don’t want to miss or take for granted.
In conclusion confusion, I am evolving these dusty, unread halls of a website to a monthly update. With the level of school work I am undertaking and the desire to have my creative outputs be worth the time I eek out for them, I think a monthly roundup will be a nice schedule. Other such writings and murmurings on the site will ebb and flow as my murmuring heart desires (was that joke lost in translation? Asking for A F(ib)riend :P). Honestly, I know I don’t add anything particularly innovative to the massive online universe of people’s writings and ideas and opinions. Maybe I can also be a tiny glimmer of good in a week of hardship for someone. We shall see. If you have any glimmering moments you noticed this past month pop them in the comments below, I would love to bask in them with you. To keep marching towards hope.
