Blogging is a State of Mind

So where have I gone? And why do I feel like I'm always explaining myself?

All summer I felt like I was in overwhelm. It's better now since the kids are back in school but some days I feel like I start going from the moment I get up until the moment I go to bed. Lots of other bloggers are busy. So what's my excuse?

The beauty of reaching, ahem, a certain age (over 40) is you begin to really become familiar with who you are. I think I've reached the point that I accept some of my flaws and realize that if I haven't changed by now it probably isn't going to happen.

I've learned that I'm terrible about returning things. I've run through my fair share of video rental stores. I've funded more then a couple of books in various public libraries across the lower 48 states with over due book fines. I used to beat myself up about this but I realized that there were worse flaws and to just accept this one. I don't borrow things from friends of neighbors. I rarely rent a movie other than Netflix. I try the library from time to time and then go back to allowing myself to buy a book at Costco every other week, it's what I would pay in late fees anyway.

But I have another flaw that probably needs some work. I'm a classic avoider. The more a situation gets out of hand, the more I avoid it. It's a terrible character trait, one I really do need to work on. Honesty has always been my policy on my blog so here's the honest truth: the longer I go without blogging, the harder it is to do it.

There's so many reasons for this. One is stated above. I don't blog and when I finally do I feel the need to explain myself. So here's the deal. I've confessed my flaw and I'm going to stop apologizing for absences because this is getting beyond ridiculous. Sometime I won't be here. Sometimes I'm going to just jump right in like I have. Hopefully the more I just do it and stop being intimidated (by my ownself, I might add) the sooner I'll get back to normal. Not that anyone could really call me normal.

Two, blogging is a state of mind. When you're full on blog mode everything in your life is potential blog fodder. Your view of life is skewed a bit and it's not entirely a bad thing. But when you get out of blogging mentality its harder to jump right back in.

I'll also confess here that I've considered giving up blogging but ultimately have decided not to stop. I really like to blog when my heart is in it and I really do miss it. I just need to jump back into the saddle again.

And while we're on the topic of blogging and the love of blogging I'll mention one other thing. You probably noticed (or not) that my BlogHer ads and blog roll are missing. I removed them. They used to pay me about $25 a month but after the first of the year I was lucky to get $10 a month and I had more page loads than when I was making more. BlogHer has rules and requirements and I decided I was tired of worrying about them. There was a time that I saw getting on the BlogHer network as a sign of "making it" in the blogging world. I guess my priorities have changed. That or I've grown up a bit, as improbable as that might seem.

So, I hereby promise to stop beating myself up for not blogging more and just blog. I promise to have more fun with blogging and I promise to just get over myself. This is supposed to be fun.

Merrily, Merrily, Merrily...My Life is But a Blog

I think maybe I blog too much. Or I think that maybe I view my life in terms of my blog. Something happens and I, and now those around me, ask "Is this blog worthy?" or "Will you put this in your blog... please???"

Julia had a chorus concert on Tuesday night. It was all the sixth grade middle school chorus and sixth grade middle school band. Now keep in mind that ALL of the sixth grade must either be in chorus, band or the very small orchestra and you can imagine how many students there were.

Many students(Parents+Siblings+Grandparents)= Many, many people

(Who said math wasn't my strong suit??? And story problems too!)

We arrived later than the preordained 6:45 for a 7:00 concert time (which never, never happens by the way -- the starting on time, not the us being late) and because of our lateness the gym bleachers were completely full.

Trace lucked out had class so he missed the concert but for everyone else in the house attendance was mandatory, much to Ross' chagrin. So there we are standing next to the bleachers, me carrying Emma, Ross carrying Ryan and Jenna jumping around like a Mexican Jumping Bean. Add a case of claustrophobia for Ross, lightly stir with a swirling crowd and you get a cranky teenager. But chairs were pulled out of closets and we were soon seated to the side of the bleachers, Ryan on Ross' lap and me holding both Emma and Jenna on my lap.

The concert begins, the babies are being quiet and Ross becomes quite aggravated when he realizes that the band and chorus are toggling back and forth AND they start out demonstrating the breathing techniques. I had a program in my hand and Ross asked "How many songs do they perform?"

I looked at the program and tried to be evasive. "Several."

"How many is several?"

"More than you want to know."

But it seemed to go quickly, when band starts learning their instruments they are playing one line songs! I remember well from Trace's trombone days and my flute lessons. We happened to be sitting right in front of the band and towards the end of the concert Emma started waving her arms around when they played and stopping when they stopped. It didn't Ross and I long to figure out that Emma was watching the band director and mimicking him.

And of course I had to have video of that!

Emma was on my lap so I handed the camera to Ross who got several short videos of Emma in action-- and she was a very excited band director! I also got several short videos of Julia's chorus and mercifully, the concert was over.

When we got home I told Julia about Emma and she wanted to watch the video of Emma on my camera. I was too tired Tuesday night to upload the pictures and videos and write a blog post so I put it off until last night. But before I uploaded the pictures and videos I planned to delete the ones that didn't turn out. I started going through my pictures and there were no videos of Emma directing the band. At first I thought that Ross hadn't actually filmed it and I was beginning to become very aggravated at him. But then I realized that Julia had actually watched the videos of Emma and commented on how cute she was.

She erased the videos. She was now on The List. You know the list I speak of, the one that includes people that you would like to thrash within an inch of their life. Thankfully for Julia, she was temporarily predisposed. A life was saved. And luckily for her I don't stay mad long. Life saved twice.

But when I realized that my wonderful videos were deleted I was very vocal about my displeasure while I sat at my computer.

Ross walked up and said "Did you already write a blog post about it and now you can't use it?"

"No, I haven't written anything yet but I had something planned..."

"And now you don't have anything to write about?"

"That's not the point!"

And then I realized that my life is but a blog. I need to get a life. But wait, my blog is my life. Hey wait, was this an episode on The Twilight Zone?