Confession: I had to schedule the time to write this post. I had to set my alarm for a half hour earlier than I needed to be up, in order to get something posted. It's awful because I haven't been able to drag myself to this space, and I hate that. I hate when writing something, anything feels like a chore. But I also hate when I haven't posted anything in almost a week.
A few years ago when I first started blogging, I fell in love with a lifestyle blogger. Her blog and her life seemed perfect. She was crafty, she was the first to master the cake box-cake pop, she had style and grace and wrote beautifully. I sometimes visited her blog three times a day, hoping and praying that a little of her magic would rub off on me. My day was made by reading a new post from her, and not because I'm a stalker with single white female tendencies, but because she was so damn inspiring. One morning I visited her site and there wasn't a new post. No new updates. No new crafts or things to bake. I went back after lunch and again at dinner, and still nothing. WTF? Didn't this blogger know that I needed to read new content every day? Didn't she realize the world was waiting on her?
Of course she didn't. She had a life. A beautiful one. A busy one. A real one.
I get it now. The compulsion to continue to churn out new and interesting material every day until you just can't. Today, almost four years after the fact, I get that most bloggers don't have the time to just sit and write all day. We are mothers, some of us working mothers, we are wives and sisters and daughters and friends. We have school drop off and lunches to make and toilets to clean. And then some of us then have to go and put in a shift at work, or still work from home. Some days it's just impossible to meet your readers with something new.
Today, I realize how much I miss this place. I squandered a lot of time this summer. And not just time I could have spent writing, but time I could have spent with my kids and my family. I worked a lot this summer, a fact that just defeated me. It wasn't the summer I wanted to have with my kids. I wanted to do beach days and pool days and get that beautiful brown color that my kids developed. Instead I worked. And it sent me to this place that exhausted me and paralyzed me. Now that school has started the guilt has set in. I could write an entire post on what we could have done this summer if I just would have accepted this season in my life instead of fought so hard to avoid it and it's truths.
I woke up this morning thinking that if I could just spend the day writing, I could get my life back on track. I could have fresh content for readers. Fill you guys in on the last two weeks. Share a recipe or what I have been reading. That was the plan for today, to write my heart out. Then I remembered that we need things from Costco and Target. I remembered that I need to pay the dance studio and call the dentist. I remembered that my family wants to see me on my day off. And I remembered that this blog is not always as important as I think it is. Which is hard to admit. Which breaks my heart. But it's solidly the truth.
This post has been all over the place. I blame the time of day. But there is something quite poetic about writing as the sun comes up. A new day is emerging, and with it I hope a new outlook. I hope that after we get through this first week of school, and get settled in a new routine, finding time to write will become easier. Finding time for life in general with hopefully become easier. Until then, I will take these pockets of time where I can get them. Even if they feel like the middle of the night.
