30 days of writing

I read The Pioneer Woman. She is amusing and helps distract me from my world. She also reminds me that you can be crazy in love with the same man for an extremely long number of years. I am hoping for that. Recently she went to the BlogHer conference and embarassed herself rather profoundly. So, after reading that, i wanted to read "the rest of the story" as paul harvey or whatever that guy's name is, would say. So, I clicked through to Mrs. Flinger's post of the same incident.. Which took half a day because P-Dub has so much traffic she crashed Mrs. Flinger's website!! While there I noticed that Mrs. Flinger has joined or started a challenge or something called 30 days of (blank). At the time I thought "Ha! I never do ANYTHING for 30 days much less something I'm challenged or requested or required to do!" But then I thought "Maybe this is the time, maybe THIS is the thing that will jump start my 'life' Maybe this time it will be different. hmmm, what can I agree to do for 30 days???" And came up with absolutely nothing, so i gave up the thought and moved on to facebook games.

Today I took a half day to spend the afternoon @ a movie with the daughter of a dear friend, a daughter who is nearly my age, certainly my generation, and who I'm building a new friendship with. I just love making new friends. Don't get me wrong it has it's moments and it's hiccups and stressors and 'oh my gawd am i a completely overanalytical PSYCHO because I even wonder if she thought (X) when I said That?!?!' But, at the end, I usually have someone whose company I enjoy and who 'gets' me on some level worth having and who I can offer something back to. I'm not much for one-sided friendships.

Turned out that the daughter, Sarah, (you can read her stuff here by the way) ended up with no vehicle, so rather than seeing a movie and having cawfee here in my town, I drove to her town and visited with her and my dear friend (who has the BESTEST stories and desperately needs to be blogging for the amusement of the rest of us, at minimum) for a bit and then headed out. She had emailed me that she wouldn't have a vehicle and was thinking that she wanted a 'writing date.' I have no idea what that was supposed to look like because we did not do that at all. We went to one coffee shop which closed, literally, at that moment, welcome to 'small town america' and were required to go to the other coffee shop in town that is a drive through small trailer-like-place on a major corner and has only drive through. But, oh do they have DIVINE cawfee AND fantastic muffins. So, we went to a park and sat at a picnic table and just talked and shared. About life and families and siblings and relationships and marriage vs singleness, and parenthood, and other friends we've had, and even a bit about church! (gasp!) All in all we just plain had a lovely time visiting and getting to know one another. She laughed at all my obvious jokes, bonus for her! and good for my ego. ((this is super weird writing this knowing full darn well that she AND her mother will read this.... makes me wonder if they'll laugh at this word or that phrase ... not that I have anything negative or less than rosy to say, just disconcernting to be absolutely certain that she will read this in the near future.)) So, she laughed at my jokes and I laughed at hers and we snorted at the ridiculousness of other people and shared. Just plain shared. It was lovely.

@ the end of it all she lent me a book. A book that is, apparently, so good that she bought 2 copies because she figured between moving back to the States from Colombia only so she can move on to Kuwait in a couple of weeks, she would end up losing a copy somewhere in the world and wish for a second. Or something like that. So, she lent me this book, Old Friend from Far Away - The Practice of Writing Memoir. And explained that it was excellent, especially in the field of honing your own craft of writing. So, i tucked it in my bag with the thought "I need to get this out as soon as I get home so I can get reading it so I can return it in a timely manner. Instead of the "I've had your book for over a year now Liz and I do apologize, but I did try to get ahold of you to return it a couple of weeks ago when I was in Madison, but you didn't return my call" way that I usually borrow a book.

As per usual on my drive home I made a phone call to a friend to tell her something and we chatted a bit. (Hi Mandy!) And then I called another friend to return her call and confirm that I was babysitting for her tomorrow nite. And then I called my friend from Florida who had called me while @ Sarah's temporary house where they have almost no cell phone reception as a rule inside their property line. And next thing I know it's 9 pm and then some. But I remembered the book and decided to grab it quick to see what the introduction looked like and see how much I could possibly get through yet tonight before my eyelids get so heavy I can't actually decipher the words on the page I'm staring at any longer. Okay, so that is an exaggeration, but only because I have a j-o-b that expects me to be inside the building, showered and dressed and ready to be productive at 8 am. Which is really about the time I'd like to start thinking about getting out of bed. But that is another post for another day, maybe, if I can drag it out into an entire post.

While reading the intro to that book I was ever so slightly energized to get writing. And after sharing the afternoon with Sarah I was inspired/encouraged to get writing again. And the planets aligned, and it was the Age of Aquarius and Faery dust settled across my forehead and shoulders and i thought

I could do 30 days of writing!!!

That I think I could do. Especially since once I read through the introduction and did a bit of skimming of the table of contents I realized that the book could help me with posts on days that I feel like I have nothing to say worth posting.

Then, it happened. The same thing that always happens. Every time I try something like this, I fail. Why? Because I inevitably overcomplicate it. Or I get it so built up to a thing in my mind that I simply give up before I've started. And I caught myself thinking "Hm, what else can I add to this? What else can I do for 30 days alongside the blogging that I 'need' to get done?" Apparently I am a chronic and addicted multi-tasker. I can't even simply take 30 days, live my life as per usual, and add a blog a day. I have to add a blog, and business phone calls, and cleaning/tidying my house, and exercising-eating right, and reading, and and and and and and and

And I caught it. I heard myself. And, most importantly, I stopped myself. "Why can't I live my life as per usual, and simply, only, exactly, write one post per day for the next 30 days?" So, rather than overcomplicate as usual, rather than quit before I've begun, rather than multitask to the Nth degree, I am going to post. I am going to post one post per day. I am going to do my bestest to have something worth saying every day, but, clearly, some days will be silly or funny or cute or a picture or a funny video or nothing profound at all. But, I will post.

Yes, I realize it's already the 3rd. Thus begets my last and fairly major roadblock to any similar endeavor in the past. I am a rule buck-er. I don't like rules. Even self-imposed, ridiculous, for my own good, have no punishment nor basis in reality, rules. If I set a 'rule' that I can only have X amount of chocolate per day, I will go over for the sheer fact that I am an adult and I can have chocolate if I want chocolate. Or any number of other rules. Instead of quitting before I've begun because it's already the 3rd I'm simply going to go to Sept 3 .... or Aug 31 ... or Dec 24. Who knows!

Are you with me?? Do you have something you'd like to try for the next 30 days??

Jump right on in, the water's fine, a bit chilly, but it'll just wake you up, bracing cold they say ... no one knows who they are, but apparently they're quite smart.

p.s. no facebook games were harmed in the writing of this post, nor were any played, in fact they were all quite effectively ignored universally.