A Planner Unplanned

Cole gave me a planner about two years ago for my birthday. The cover is faux pleather gray and features rose gold embossing of a crescent moon with rays coming from the top and some constellations underneath, also embossed in rose gold. It's spiral-bound.  It's also undated. This goes great with my inconsistency in using a planner which I've always wanted to be different. I used to think I hated undated planners but I was wrong about that and turns out, lots of other things too. Ha. Anyway, I found this page in that planner dated (via the opposite page) May 2022 and it made me laugh and almost cry. I did those things, y'all. I did them all. 

The words on the right are from the G Flip song I Am Not Afraid which quickly became my anthem. Follow me on Spotify so we can share music. It's my love language. One of them.

I can't wait to tell you more about all that but it won't be today. It was that month (May) I showed up solo to ecstatic dance in the park in Manitou Springs and met some stellar humans who also introduced me to the drum circle that would forever change mi vida (my life). 

40 is hitting differently. It feels like December is when The Things happened. Many of them. Eeeee. There's been what feels like a million. 

There was this seemingly very insignificant moment but I want to record it... I was talking to the girls on the phone sometime in early December. They were at David's. He's (what I've started calling) my parenting partner and the best father to my kids. He lives in Show Low right now with his girlfriend and her kids who are mostly younger than mine. We're separated. The girls were excitedly telling me about our Christmas elf, Buddy and how they're helping David with the shenanigans that are an Elf and they're doing it for the younger kids. David was always better at the elf than I was because I was usually tired and over it by the time it got to 10 p.m. on any given night in December with little ones. So he'd take over. The girls were telling me what he was up to that night. They laughed and I read some excitement in their voices about being on the other side of it now... helping. For some reason, it was that moment where it hit me. This is where we are now. 

He lives with her. They have a blended family. My kids are the older ones now. It's our elf, but theirs too. 

I don't know how to do whatever the fuck I'm doing right now, but I'm doing it anyway. Sometimes when I read Ash Ambirge's work, I feel like it's a step into my own brain, but her words are prettier and more cohesive than mine and I guarantee her cottage and farmhouse are too. I don't even own a cottage or a farmhouse yet. When I read about her adventures though, I want to and it inspires me to write. 

She has a course I'm taking. I've bugged her assistant more than one time (only two, okay?) for an affiliate code because I believe in her/it that much so I'm hesitant to share more (just right now! It will be all I can talk about soon). I haven't even finished the course yet but I'm telling you, this woman is a queen and a goddess and also human and she doesn't even know I exist but I feel connected. Not in the creeper way but in the way where people are sharing their stories via words and it makes me feel so much less alone. 

Sure she's got a cottage/farmhouse, a 92 year old built-in security system in the form of her neighbor named Roger, she maybe wants kids?, and lives in Ohio. I've got a regular house in a cul de sac, neighbors who pick up my packages, three kids already, and live in Colorado. She's also just actually DOING all the things I want to be doing. In reading her, and several others' I glean information and feel incredibly thankful there are people actually putting in the effort to show up on this weird world we call the internet. I didn't realize it, but that's where it's at for me. I think it always has been. So anyway, I'm gonna be here for now. I love this space but all the other people are also writing on Substack. I can't wait to share more about them too because that's how this creator world works. We share shit we love and it is mutually beneficial. A win-win. 

I used to average at least a thousand visitors to this here page (thanks to some viral Pinterest posts) before the new Google Analytics change. I'd love it if someone who knew things about that wanted to help me. I've tried doing it on my own, but it isn't working. I'll pay, or trade. :-) Someone is working on a visual update and I'm hopeful I can nail the Analytics stuff down when we make the switch. Aye. Halp. 

Anyway, I'm going to continue to use page breaks liberally because the effect of them is so poignant. I used to use sparingly but my attention deficit brain (thanks short form video) thinks in page breaks basically so I'm going to work WITH that and not against it. Ha. Plus, I'm 40 and I do what I want. Jk I'm not that entitled. I AM working on doing more things I desire thanks to my recovery from people-pleasing. lol. 

I love you. 

Posting here the last three times has been such an adventure and I just want to name that out loud too. I write these posts quickly, without a ton of thought, I find a photo that'll work, do all of that as fast as I can too because it's an exercise in just Doing The Thing... imperfection and all. There have been 46 times I've thought to myself  'I'll finish that later' which is exactly why I have 229 drafts. Okay. Thanks for listening. 

Also, if you're here, please consider joining me over on Substack. I'm not sure where I'll end up but maybe somewhere here AND there because turns out, I also like being in the middle. ;-)