This Time Last Year

This time last year I was creating this space. I was transferring my old blog that I had for years, to this blog. Going through every post to fix the formatting and re-add photos. Lots of tedious work. And it was all going to be worth it because I was going to make an effort to write as often as possible, take photos, chat about anything on my mind last year.

Then a month after hitting publish on everything, a freaking global pandemic.

I really tried to will myself to write. But by October I really felt entirely burnt out creatively.

And it felt weirdly undeserved.

Because I hadn’t done much writing on here, doing the podcast hadn’t really taken up too much of my time, and the Rangers played such a shortened season that I almost forgot I had even covered it! But that felt like overall it took up very little of my time through out the year that it didn’t feel as though I had truly done enough to feel like I was tired from it.

I had to remind myself that we’re all surviving a global pandemic and that is work enough. That alone takes a huge emotional and mental toll on us. It’s hard to be creative when, if you’re like me, you only leave your house to pick up groceries. And even then, I’m not going inside anywhere. The only places I’ve been inside since last March was the hospital for a doctor’s appointment and a building to go vote. Those aren’t exactly places where it sparks inspiration.

I just picked up my camera for the first time since February, on Sunday when it snowed here. Which even then didn’t spark much considering the snow didn’t stick and snow falling is kinda hard to capture.

All this to say, I want to do better about writing on here, as is my goal every year, but I also want to give myself grace when I don’t write as much as I want. Grace when I just have absolutely no inspiration so instead spend my time listening to true crime podcasts while filling out yet another job application that I more than likely will hear nothing back about it.

It’s looking like for now, my next few blog posts will be book reviews, as I’ve already finished two this year that I loved. But thankfully that’s something I have to look forward to writing about, actual inspiration to build off of! I feel like I continue to say this in maybe every post, but my blog has kind of become a journal of sorts and writing posts like this really help me process the things that spin around in my brain and kinda of release the burden of feeling lazy or just not doing enough by my own standards. Which also means I usually don’t know how to end these types of posts so now that my thoughts are out of my brain and even though this is a short post, I guess this is where I should end it?

Hopefully, this year leads to more inspiration than last.