Back in the saddle
It’s been a minute: happy September! We’re on the second day of false-autumn here in Chicago; it’s going to get hot again tomorrow, but I sure have enjoyed pulling cozy zip-ups out of the closet and making my kids a pot of mint tea after getting chilled outside.
My big kids are in school (pre-K and 1st!) and my toddler is newly in daycare, so I’ve had a quiet house to work in for the first time in 2022. Since February ‘22 we had a nanny caring for the little kids after a brief stint in daycare proved demoralizingly unpredictable (not just covid scares, but every little non-covid sniffle triggered 3+ days at home, etc etc). In-home childcare was much more expensive, but blessedly more predictable as far as working hours go…but actually working was rough. More than just being distracted by eruptions of conflict or laughter or stomping on squeaky floorboards right overhead, the real struggle was a constant battle against going upstairs and intervening, and the guilt of working on something so formless when my beautiful, hilarious, cranky kids were *right there* overhead. It would’ve been easier if I had meetings to attend or spreadsheets to manage or something concrete and accomplishable, but writing is so amorphous, even when I tried strict pomodoro and word count goals. My hands were free, but my mind and heart were half gone.
But now? Our sweet nanny is off to grad school, and all the kids love school—they’re all getting great educations and play time with peers and the house is QUIET. It wasn’t until I had three great writing days in a row (an unheard of streak) that I realized just how distracted I had been. Victory! Onward!!
Other Things:
I recently finished watching Joe Pera Talks With You, which got properly on my radar after seeing the outpouring of sadness from friends on Twitter when the show was cancelled, and oh my god what a special, quiet, specific and deeply tender world that show made. Mesmerizing.
I joined a gym! I’ve only been a member of one gym before, a bare-bones powerlifting & Olympic lifting gym from back when I was an amateur power lifter; it was in the basement of an apartment building and it didn’t have air conditioning and had lots of signs around about NOT USING STEROIDS. There was an older man regular who (like many regulars) definitely WAS using steroids who would hang laminated shirtless pictures of himself on the walls over the mirrors! Good times, great topless oldies. In the intervening decade, my bod has been through a lot; among other challenges, I have a slipped disc that sends numbness down my leg any time I try to lift or do any rigorous exercise since my spine injury in 2018. Not great! But since swimming every day on my Texas trip, I haven’t gotten swimming out of my mind because it didn’t hurt my back at all. Fast forward, turns out the closest gym to me by a mile that has a pool is veeeeeEEEeeeery bougie and status-y and nice? Like, I put on makeup to make them think I fit in for my initial tour. “I’m not a sloppy goblin, I’m one of you! Look at this poorly applied eyeliner!!” I definitely feel like an anthropologist observing a different culture in there. Lots of tall, tanned, muscular people who look like they work in finance, and I’m next to them in my hairy peasant body having a fucking blast. I’ve been swimming every weekday morning the past two weeks and it is life changing! Re-integrating self and bod after postpartum disconnect! Getting my money’s worth by using ALL the lotions and potions in the locker room! What a treat, what a treat!!
I’m on the cusp of making a switch from writing to drawing, finally. I’ve gotten most of the script written except for an important part of the third act that I’m having a hard time unlocking, but the first chapter hasn’t changed at all in months, so I’m going to put the story problems on ice and get inky fingers again. You’ll be the first to see, pen pals!
Diary Comics