Two Anniversaries

Today is the anniversary of the first day I started my current hellish job.  Twelve years.  It feels like an eternity, but it doesn’t quite qualify for that status.  When I started this job I was a wee tot.  I was 26 years old, about a year out of law school, dating my husband (we wouldn’t be engaged for another month), and living in a small condo with my dog.  Kids were not even on my radar at that point.  And you know what?  I loved the job.  It was the first job I ever had that I was actually excited to go to.  I looked forward to getting out of bed in the morning.  And that lasted for a few years, which is quite a feat considering how jaded and burned out I am from the same job at this point.  But at the beginning, I couldn’t be more satisfied with my employ.  I wasn’t paid much, being that I was a public servant, but it was enough to pay my bills and was the first really substantial and consistent paycheck I had ever received.  Things were good.

Cut to about 10 years later . . . a marriage, a house, 2 kids, another house.  Life was different.  Fuller.  But now, I wasn’t jumping out of bed in the morning to go to work.  Getting out of bed was a herculean effort.  I was heavier, in many ways.  I was more weighted down.  And I was searching for something.  I didn’t know what I needed, but I knew that I needed an outlet.  A different path.  A distraction.

Thus this blog was born.  Two years ago.*  Actually, 2 years ago as of 3 days ago.  I missed the actual date.  I feel a little guilty that I wasn’t paying attention closely enough to recognize the blog’s actual anniversary date.  Sorry, girl.  It wasn’t an intentional slight.  I’ve just been . . . weighted again.

I never wanted this blog to feel like an obligation.  Something I had to drag myself out of bed to do, like my current job.  I love to write, I love the blog and I especially love the blogging community and the myriad of close friends I have made since beginning this journey.  I would never go back, and don’t regret one minute of my time as a blogger, despite the negative connotations that the word may have in general society.  As I’ve stated before, I found my tribe while blogging, and it was the best thing that could have happened to me at the time. It made me finally feel like I belonged to something, and that there were other outcasts and introverts out there that knew just how I felt.  I didn’t feel so alone anymore.  Like a stranger with my face pressed up against the glass of society, looking inside at the “normal” people.  I didn’t need to stand out in the cold any longer.  I had finally found my people.

All of this is to say that I just don’t really know what path this blog will take in its 3rd year of existence.  Maybe it’s just a pedestrian case of writer’s block.  Or possibly in my cyclical ebb and flow of creativity, I am in the far reaches of my ebb.  Maybe it’s just the heat.  Whatever it might be, I have not felt like I’ve had much to share lately.  I was trying to steer the blog in a new direction for a while, focusing on more actual writing, and less goofy pictures of people dressed badly.  I think I was moderately successful on that path for a while, but now the well has run dry of ideas.  I’ve been trying to dredge up something, anything, but alas, there is naught.

Seriously, that last sentence up there.  Could that be any more pretentious and dense?  This is what I’m dealing with, people. This is where my mind is.

So, for now, I would not expect much to come from the blog.  I am going on vacation in a couple of weeks, and hopefully that will prompt my storytelling juices to flow once again.  A trip to the beach with my crazy extended family is always good for a story or two.  If something strikes me before then, I will definitely share.  But I can’t make any promises.

And to all of the newbies who have recently followed me, I know.  Bad timing, right?  But I want to say thanks for coming along on this journey with me, even though nobody knows where it will take us yet.  And I promise that I will get back to it, and hopefully will produce something worth reading again.  It just might take me a bit to get back on that horse.  Hang in there, if you would.  To new and old, good friends or hail fellows well met, it may be a bumpy ride, but it will be one worth taking . . . at least I hope so.

See you soon!

*(If you are new here and want the full history of how I actually started the blog, check out my 1 year anniversary post).

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