Emerging

So I’ve been pretty open about how my mental health has been undergoing a beating, mostly from the pandemic but also other factors. Every once in a while, though, I catch a glimpse, a shift, something unfurling just a little bit.

August has been like that. In July, work finally settled down, and I had two weeks off in a row and one of them involved unplugging at a camp on a lake. That was the reset I needed.

I still haven’t been writing. But I’m reading more/faster again — I’ve zoomed through my last four books — and more deeply — I almost missed my subway stop a few weeks ago. Can’t remember the last time that happened.

Last week we finished Good Omens 2 and I developed a brief obsession. I talked my spouse’s ear off about it. I thought about doing a couple’s cosplay, even though that takes waaay too much executive function. (I am so much like TV Aziraphale it isn’t even funny, though my spouse isn’t particularly like TV Crowley, thank goodness.) The song that weaves through Season 2, “Everyday” by Buddy Holly, got stuck in my head for a full week.

It finally cleared out when I fell down another rabbit hole, thanks to KD — a cappella folk/trad groups. First there was VoicePlay. (That’s their YT channel. I’m not going to pick just one video to share, because I can’t choose!) Then there was Geoff Castellucci, the lead singer of VoicePlay, who also puts out his own videos in which he sings all the parts (with different costumes to match) and splices them together. Most recently, there was Home Free.

Then I had to put together a couple of a cappella playlists to include groups I’d already collected. (On the folk/trad side, Windborne and Pete’s Posse, and on the classical music side, Voces8 and Barbara Furtuna. There’s also Kongero, a Swedish group, but they didn’t quite fit the mood of either playlist.)

And now…I’m curious about what will draw my interest next. Maybe, just maybe, the writing will come back.

I’m looking forward to finding out.