Free Association

Five years old is kicking my butt. Today I found myself thinking wistfully of the baby stage. Maybe it's because two of our closest friends just had babies.

Could I please stop self editing? Holy hell it's driving me crazy. Constantly going back, delete, delete, delete. Rephrase. No wonder I'm feeling creatively blocked!

I'm feeling creatively blocked. I compose posts in my head all the time - on the way to work/school, on the way home, as I'm falling asleep at night, as I'm washing my hair in the shower. A constant stream of words go through my head and, in my head, they sound fantastic. But by the time I finally get a chance to put them down on paper - the words escape me and I find myself hovering over the delete key more than anything else. It's making me nuts. The words are there.

Then I stop what I'm writing and re-read what I've written. Why? I don't know. I wish I could write what's in my head. It sounds so much better there. Oh, gotta go flip the chicken. Nope, not ready yet. Maybe if I just brainstorm? Free, free, free - what is that expression? freestyle? no freemind? no what is it? god, that's going to bug me. free association. Thank goodness I figured that out.

So what is this post about? My stifled creativity or how 5 year olds are kicking my ass? Let's first start with the stifled creativity. So, I'm constantly composing posts in my head - we've covered that. Then, by the time I sit down to write I'm too tired. By then, it's 10:00pm and I'm bone tired without a creative trickle left, let alone a stream. I also long to start reading again. You know, great books, great fiction, great non-fiction. Great writers. But I don't have time. I don't have time to seek out great work and, if I had something great to read, I'd fall asleep by page 5. Instead, I read blogs. Tom wonders what I'm doing whenever I have the computer on my lap. I feel stupid saying "reading blogs" but it's what I like to do. I'm sure he wonders what I find so fascinating about other peoples' lives - people I've never met. But, some of them are brilliant writers and I always feel like my soul is a little nourished when I read something beautiful, something thoughtful or brilliant. I crave that.

I'm sitting here looking at my bare walls and I so badly want to fill them but am waiting to be inspired. By what? I don't know. I want to put something up that makes sense, that suits us, our home, our lives. I want art but don't know what kind. Photography? Prints? What? Pictures of family? It drives Tom crazy that we haven't put anything up yet but I don't want to just throw something up on the walls just to cover them.

Then I see something in a magazine - a cool cabinet with carefully, thoughtfully collected mementos and inside my head whines "i want that".

I used to hate quiet. I always turned the TV on even if I didn't watch it, just to have some noise. Now, I long for quiet. It soothes me. I love leaving the lights off in the house with just one light on, just one pool of light that casts shadows into the living room or hallway. I can breathe.

Tomorrow I'll probably hate the fact that I wrote this. Will wrestle internally with uncertainty - should I leave it up or take it off? I could make it private. Do I care? Is it part of me? Does it deserve to be shared? Would anyone benefit? Does it matter?

Will it hurt anyone? That's the most important question. Only me. Will it?

I love my life. I just wish I had more time to nourish my soul.