Procrastination: A Stream of Consciousness

A Writing Wednesdays Post

I don’t want to write tonight. I came upstairs and am sitting in my little “office” in my bedroom, writing playlist playing, Honeysuckle candle burning, and I stare at the computer.

It’s been sixty minutes, and yet, nada. I’ve showered, deleted emails, added more albums to my writing playlist. Searched to see if there are tours for Nathaniel Rateliff, Jason Isbell, or The White Buffalo anywhere near me this summer.

The answer is no.

Looking at my school email I see an email from a former student who is now a junior in high school. She wants to interview me about our new community read for the school newspaper. For forty minutes I craft my reply, complete with links to sources and book recommendations for all of the high school students.

I might be procrastinating.

I also just googled whether you capitalize “junior” or not for that above paragraph.

I’m shaking my head at myself, though you all can’t see that.

I then head to Pottery Barn’s website. The James Recliner is 25% off, but the sale ends tonight. I look at it and think about the big empty spot in our living room where it would fit perfectly. Then I think about summer vacation and decide the empty spot can sit empty.

I come back to the blank page.

I click over to Twitter and see that Samira Ahmed’s Internment  is now on the NYT Best Seller list at number 4!!! Have you read it yet? Seriously, if not, this blog is not important. Please go order it. While you’re doing so, also order Laurie Halse Anderson’s Shout. I realize I’ve recommended them before, but they’re that important.

Thinking about those books make me consider that I need to finish a blog post so I can write a bit in my own book. I then ponder the history on my computer while writing a romance book. Hmm. Last time I wrote it looks like I searched google for information on: weather in Illinois in May, sunrise in Illinois in May, pregnancy information like when you feel the baby kick, when someone else can feel the baby kick, etc.

My history is a weird place now.

And yes, I’ve had two kids. Somehow I remember zilch about the pregnancies, at least in terms of what week anything happened. Good thing for Liam, if I’d remembered the morning sickness was that bad, for forty weeks, he might not have been here.

I kid, I kid.

Looking at that list makes me wonder if I should email a friend who is an OBGYN. I want to get this storyline right.

In the last book I consulted with friends who are: district attorneys, fire fighters, and correction officers. In this book, so far, I’ve talked to a friend about long haul trucking and another about breweries. I wonder who else I’ll chat with before I’m done.

Tupelo by Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit just came on. Man I love this song. Eyes closed, head back, I just soak it in.

I wonder where I left my characters off last time in my book. I head over to the doc and open it to find out.

If you want a sneak peek, here is the inspiration for Maggie

And here’s the inspiration for Sully

Yep. So much fun.

Hmm. Looking over the beginning of chapter eight, I remember what scene I left off in. I take about five minutes and skim the chapter, fixing up some text here and there. Then I get an idea for a scene to add and begin typing. Before I know it, five minutes has become fifteen and I have added three hundred words.

I hop back over here to report back in. Interesting, I guess the advice I give my students of getting their butt in a chair and just start writing actually has merit?

Who knew.

Off to write.

Choose Your Attitude

I teach three Language Arts classes each day. Two of the classes are blocked periods, meaning I get the same group of kids for two periods. The other class I share with my colleague, I get them fourth hour, she has them tenth hour. It’s a pretty amazing schedule.

To open class today I reminded them of the three different assignments we have this week. One is a week long assignment, one they are working on for the first three days of the week, one we will complete on Friday. I tried to give them a rough idea of how to budget their time. Then I taught the necessary lessons and let them work while I moved around to confer with kids on their writing.

The thing I’m struck by often as I talk to my seventh grade students is just how much I enjoy this age group. They are hilarious.

Yesterday, I had a kid who towers over me. Although, to be fair, I’m only five foot two. (Which is stretching the truth just a bit.) The giant kid sat down at the table with his friend when class began and gave me a side eye while he logged in to his Chromebook to “check-in” for Status of the Class.

I asked him what the look was for.

His reply was, “Soooooo, Mrs. S. Like how mad are you going to be if I mention that I *might* not have cracked a book open over Spring Break?”

My reply was to wrap my arms around his shoulders and shake him back and forth while he laughed a huge laugh that filled the room and said, “My bad…” over and over and over.

We laughed.

Today we watched THIS video when learning about Jane Goodall for a short research unit. The video has an orange monkey walking through a snowy woods at the beginning. In my 8th hour class I immediately mentioned that I didn’t know the name of this type of monkey because I knew at least three of them would ask me otherwise. As soon as I said it, I wanted to hit my head with my hand because these kids, who I adore, immediately began Googling to try and find out what the name of said monkey was.

The thing that teaching has taught me, and middle school more than any other, is the need to laugh. I could look at those furious fingers flying over keyboards to find the name of that darn monkey and want to remind them to pay attention. Instead I choose to be honored that they want to “help” me by finding the name for something I don’t know. I could get frustrated that a kid who truly needs to read each day instead spent nine days not reading. Instead I appreciate that he tells me the truth now when he absolutely didn't at the start of the year.

Choosing your attitude was something my first principal in this district talked a lot about nineteen years ago. It is just as important today as it was back then.

Most days I am grateful my job. It is a privilege to teach these kids. And while days might come where I’m exhausted, where I would have loved to stay in bed just a big longer, I know I will never be bored. I know that even on the hardest of days I will have a full body laugh at least once. Today that happened multiple times.

I am certainly blessed.

Food is Love

Five years ago I wrote a blog post about the memories I have tied to food. You can find it HERE. I was thinking of that post yesterday when Chris and I finished up watching the third season of Queer Eye. In it, they were encouraging a guy to cook, to pass down receipes to his daughter through the food they made together. One of the guys said something like, “Food is love.”

That made me pause. By no means do I think that if one doesn’t like to cook that they aren’t showing love. Of course there are other ways to do that. But I do believe that when I cook for my family; that when I think of them while I buy groceries, plan meals, cook the meals; I’m absolutely doing all of that from a place of love.

Yesterday I made turkey meatloaf for dinner. (Side note, it is amazing and you can find the recipe HERE.) When I opened my copy of the original Barefoot Contessa cookbook, I saw this note on the top of the page.

I’ve adopted my parents’ habit of writing a note when I try a recipe and the results of the recipe. Chris’s dad, Len, passed away just shy of five months ago. I made this recipe for him one of the first times he and Aiko, Chris’s stepmom, came to visit. Chris had mentioned that Len loved meatloaf, and he was right. I’ve never made it again and not thought of him. I doubt I ever will.

I hope I pass on the joy of cooking for those you love to my boys. The jury is still out on Liam. He’s thirteen and thrilled to eat chips and/or any carbs we happen to have. But Luke, I think he’s got it. I went to grab some leftover roasted potatoes one day over break. They were mysteriously missing from the fridge, a common occurrence in our household. Luke happened to be standing in the kitchen and asked me what I was looking for. When I told him, he said he used them the day before. I asked if he just ate them plain and he shared that his girlfriend had come over after softball practice. He wanted to feed her because she hadn’t had lunch yet so he combined the potatoes, chopped up leftover hamburgers, some cream of chicken soup, and sprinkled cheese on top. He figured that would make a casserole and baked it in the oven. Now I have no idea how it tasted, but I loved that he wanted to make sure she was fed and didn’t go the easy route, but tried to create something for her.

Tonight I looked in the refrigerator trying to decide what to make for dinner from the meals I had purchased ingredients for this past weekend. Liam came in from track and looked a little down. Glancing in the fridge, I turned to him and said, “Buttermilk pancakes for dinner?” His smile was all the answer I need.

Food is absolutely about love.

Reflecting on Spring Break

Like all good things, Spring Break is finally coming to an end. I don’t think it is an over exaggeration to say I really needed this break. I’m not sure why I needed it more this year than usual, but I truly did. I was worn out. Though, to be fair, I still am. But I needed that time just to sit, to be still, to be present.

This week gave me that.

It was bookended by two indoor track meets for Luke. Beyond that, however, the nine days since I was last at school have been blissfully unscheduled.

Friends posted online gorgeous photos from far away. Sandy beaches, amusement parks, ball games, and more. And we’ve gone on vacation over break for many years, but more often than not, we stay home.

I’m grateful for the quiet.

My break was filled with quiet days and nights at home.

Catching up with my sons who are all too busy,

And will be gone all too soon.

Sixteen and thirteen,

Almost fourteen.

I wonder where the days have gone.

It was filled with a few hours of babysitting,

Nieces that are six and two,

With crazy amazing imaginations.

Games of hide and seek,

Building palaces for dogs

Dreaming up stories.

Sports, as always.

Running, running, running,

Shouting with joy,

Groaning in defeat.

It was filled with the necessary.

Taxes.

Groceries,

Organization.

And it was filled with words,

Nine books read.

Stories alive in my mind and in my heart.

Words written,

My fingers clicking across the page,

Over ten thousand added to my book

Another five thousand on this blog.

Days stretched upon days.

I slept, read, wrote, and slept some more.

And actually squeezed in a date with this guy.

What could be better than that?

Find Those Oxygen Masks

Oxygen masks. I mean, I hate flying anyway. While optimistic by nature, typically, my flying self is a giant pessimist. I always assume we will be crashing. As soon as the lovely folks from Southwest get up and begin going through the safety lesson, I try to focus anywhere but on what they are saying. My particular brand of anxiety means that the more I think about the worst case scenario, the more I am absolutely convinced it will happen. So, since I already know how to exit out of the plane, that the seat can be used as a flotation device, etc., I choose to think of other thoughts.

One of their lines, however, has stuck with me, even though I try and forget it. You need to put on your oxygen mask first. This truth is one that I’ve only recently applied to my own life. For years I think I put the needs of my family, my students, my colleagues, far ahead of any of my own. I wrote about this at the end of the post HERE in a post from December of 2017 and why I began reading romance books. But this is something I’ve continued to think about. See, reading romance books, writing a romance book myself, have been my own little acts of rebellion. I truly don’t think of “my book” as something others will read one day. I mean, I do plan on publishing them, but these characters live in my head. Letting them out onto the page, it’s like I’m getting to watch them act out the scenes I’ve already dreamed up. Heading to Champaign to write each day over Spring Break has felt almost selfish, it is just for me. And yet, it has been wonderful.

Today I also continued putting on my oxygen mask. In December I decided that 2019 was the year I was actually going to take care of my skin. In doing this, I started getting regular facials. I love going to see Danielle every 6-8 weeks. This is no spa-like facial, but one where I laugh for over an hour straight. She has taught me more about my skin in the last eighteen weeks than I learned in the other forty-four years. I look forward to my trips to see her more than I should, but I’m always left wishing I could record our conversation. As I told her today, she’d make an absolutely kick-ass character in one of my books, but I fear I would never do her justice.

Tonight Chris and I sat and watched the first three episodes of season three of Queer Eye on Netflix. Each episode made me tear up. The people that were starring in each were sweet, kind, giving, and hadn’t put themselves first in years, if ever. They all needed to find their oxygen masks.

I would say this is a common issue for females, mothers, teachers, etc., but I think this can be a human problem. We don’t want to be selfish and there is only so much time in the day. However, if we don’t put on our masks, who will? I’m still not great at making myself a priority, but I’ve gotten a bit better. Step by step, I’m going to find my way. Wishing you well on your journey too.

On Mary Oliver

Thursday was, apparently World Poetry Day. I had no idea there was such a thing but, thank goodness for social media, I found out just in time. As a result, I shared the Facebook post from Mary Oliver’s Facebook page of one of my favorite poems…

I have not always loved poetry. When I was a kid, I didn’t “get” it. Reading it, the meaning the teachers felt the poem was trying to convey eluded me. Writing it, forget about it. To me, there was a “right” and a “wrong” with poetry, and there was no key that allowed me into the understanding of this format of writing.

To put it plainly, poetry made me feel stupid, like I wasn’t smart enough to study it.

This wasn’t always true. As a kid in lower elementary school, Where the Sidewalk Ends was one of my favorite books. I read it cover to cover, only to close the book and start again. I’d look at Shel Silverstein’s photo on the back cover and think he was one weird dude, but he sure could write poems. I remember reading the poem Smart and thinking that it was the most hilarious thing I’d ever read.

Sometime after third grade, however, I slipped away from poetry and gave up a bit on myself. That all changed when I attended our local community college, Parkland, for a year and a half between transferring from the University of Kentucky to the University of Illinois. There, at Parkland, I had a professor for two classes where we took a deep dive into poetry. We had to analyze it, mark it up with our thinking. The first time we did, I barely wrote anything on it, I was so afraid to be wrong. I wish I remember the name of that eccentric teacher, but he yelled, raising his arms in the air, waving them around, shouting about his passion for poetry, explaining that I needed to let go of my fear.

Somehow, I did.

I fell in love with poetry that semester, and the next. I found new favorite poems, and some that weren’t for me. I talked poetry with other people in our class. I listened to our professor expound on his love of the words we shared.

I didn’t find Mary Oliver that semester. I didn’t find her for years. But one day, I stumbled upon one of her books. I soaked the poems in. I bought another book of her poems. I listened to her read her own poems. I listened to her interviews, podcasts, as I walked. Her quiet voice was a balm to my soul.

I read her poem I Worried

And wondered how she could speak right to my heart.

I read her poem The Summer’s Day

And wondered if I could get the last line tattooed on my body somewhere.

Mary Oliver’s poems spoke to me. Again, and again, and again.

We lost Oliver this year at the age of eighty-three, which seems like an event that should have made the world fall silent for at least a minute or two. I love her quiet way of noticing what many of us do not. I love her appreciation for the small. I love the way she questions.

I will miss her voice. I will miss her poetry. We needed her wisdom, now more than ever.

If you’d like to check out the podcast I mentioned above, you can find it HERE. It’s just shy of an hour, but it’s an hour well spent.