In the midst of this whole pandemic situation, I really didn’t know what to say.  I have stayed silent.  At the beginning of the year, I had several blog articles I was working on, I was rewriting scripts to revamp the podcast, and then, well, the world caught fire and started burning down around our ears. An already very strange world got even more strange and difficult to live in.  Allie went out on spring break in March and never went back to school. I found myself working from home a few days a week and working in the office the other days.  At the same time, Allie was trying to finish 2nd grade online. My days were consumed with work, helping Allie with her school work, zoom calls with her teacher sometimes twice a day, and trying to maintain some sort of normality where there was none.  I’ve mentioned before I oftentimes write or work on personal projects at lunch.  With Allie being with me 24/7 my one hour a day where I selfishly focus on my art or writing dried up and honestly with the amount of stress I was under my creativity dwindled to nothing. (Yes my office was gracious enough to let those of us with small kids bring our kids to work with us so we could maintain our school/work schedules and with the daycares closed what else were we supposed to do?) When I finally had free time at night I sure didn’t want to sit down to work.  My office never shut down, never slowed down (work actually picked up), and basically there was never a break in my work responsibilities, just more added stress. I’m thankful for job security, I know many have not been as lucky, but just for the sake of explanation, our business was considered an “essential business” so there has never been a time during this entire episode to slow down, reflect, or even simply breathe. 

Things started getting better at the end of the school year.  Allie finished with all A’s and a B’s for which I was so proud. She really worked hard, especially the last 8 weeks or so.  She did her work without complaints (for the most part) and was super good when she came to work with me.  Slowly but surely quarantine was loosened a little and the daycare opened back up on June 1st with reduced hours, but honestly, at this point Allie would have welcomed half days.  I love my pooh bear so much it hurts, but she missed her friends and I know that my work is super boring for an 8 year old - answer the phone, answer the emails, type up proposals, answer all the questions, etc.  Just not a lot of stimulation or excitement for a social butterfly kid like mine.  I love that we did got to spend so much time with each other but she was ready to see her friends and spend time with people her own age.  I got my lunchtime back.  I found myself not really ready to write but I did start drawing in June if not daily then at least two to three times a week.  Inktober (I’ll post about that but my Inktober drawings are on the blog if you’re interested, just scroll back) got my spark for drawing back going and I started sketching at lunch.  It was a way to get away from the computer and zone out for an hour and honestly, I like to draw even if I’m not the best at it.  And a funny thing started happening.  The words started to spring up again.  Sketching and journaling go hand in hand with me.  Words are images in my brain - yep I’m weird like that. I was and have been journaling a lot to vent my frustrations with everything, but truthfully, it’s not the stuff that needs to go online.  But I do miss blogging and I miss sharing my work with all of you.  I took a few days two weeks ago to spend some time with Allie before she went back to school on the 10th (holy cow) and because honestly, I haven’t been off more than a single day here or there since January.  I took off a whole 5 days - three office days and then the weekend.  I revamped my office, purged a bunch of crap, shredded bank and personal docs, and now have no excuse for not having a creative space and getting some work done. 

The world is a strange palace, but I for one am tired of being in defensive mode 24/7.  This is the world we’re living in and I’m ready to start being creative and sharing some work with all of you.  I hope you’re all staying safe my lovelies.  Be kind to those around you, but most importantly be kind to yourselves.