Normally I try to stay positive on the shared blog. I’ll rant away on my own, but I want to be encouraging and welcoming here. Well, I’m still welcoming! Come, sit down, have some cocoa or a nice cold drink (spirits optional.) Put your feet up. You deserve it. Have some cookies too. You are surviving. That is enough.
One of my friends is rereading comfort books from her younger days. Another is rewatching all her favorite horror movies. Another is writing fanfiction, righting the wrongs of a number of different canons. My kid is playing video games all night, and sleeping most of the day. I was going like gangbusters on my current novel, but now I’m not. I’m sleeping a lot (trying to, anyway) and watching rather a lot of Bob Ross painting.
We are surviving. It feels so hard right now. And it just keeps going on. I was furloughed at the end of March, all through April and halfway through May. Returning to work felt like an end of things. The world was going back to normal. Everything would be all right.
Yeah, not so much, huh?
So I’m trying to take it easy. I stepped back my plans to go hard at the healthy eating, and I’m just trying to make better choices. Obviously I can’t go to the gym right now, and outside it’s 106° or so every day, so…yeah.
I’m showing up for (virtual) write-ins, but I’m not getting down on myself when I don’t get much written. I’m not even mad (well, not much) that my gardening seems to have taken a turn for the worse. Most of my zucchini plants are not doing well, but hey. I’m trying. And, luckily for us all, my family won’t starve if I fail to produce some produce this summer!
You’ve probably read admonitions to be kind to yourself–let me add to the chorus. Life is hard right now. The world feels as if it’s on fire. Even if your particular piece of the world is doing all right at the moment, you are (presumably) human, and not immune to the suffering of others.
The need for productivity is a lie. You are enough without it. Go easy on yourself. This stuff is hard.
That’s what I keep telling myself, KD. I don’t have to write every day or be insanely productive at the day job. I can tread water if I have to. I just have to get through it, one day at a time.
Crisis mode is on.
Hugs.