I am a pro at faking:

Extroversion

Winging it

Small talk

I highly prefer:

Introversion

A solid plan

Depth & vulnerability

Raindrops on roses and first drafts rewritten

A big mug of cocoa and men who are smitten

Spring melting winter, a choir that sings

These are a few of my favorite things

I’ve had so many thoughts about routine this week. I’m reading a book by a choreographer in her 60’s, who starts every morning by hopping in a cab and going to a gym. Followed by a slew of other daily routines.

I used to write every day. For something like 7 or 8 years, I wrote daily (the sole exception was when Harry Potter midnight showings occurred, LOL).

I feel like I have no routines lately. I want them, but my body doesn’t allow for them. It feels so impossible to write if I can’t even get out of bed or if I can’t THINK due to pain. My most basic routine of going to campus every day is not even a thing since COVID.

Before I experienced chronic illness, I was one of those “put your head down and WORK” people. I was fueled by ambition and my youth and my privilege.

So right now, I don’t know my relationship with routine. I’m sort of watching it from the wings. Wishing I could dance with it, but also a tiny bit relieved I’m not expected on that dance floor all the time. I don’t know.

But I don’t have to know.

A Lamentation of March

It is a different kind of wrong than last year. It is less fear, more weariness. It is less uncertainty, more suspension.  I can put words to prayer, not only groans. The grief is effusive, not so acute. But the fatigue is nearly the same.

My body remembers March. Oh Lord, in a year I have learned and have not learned to abide. When March is over, the lesson goes on. Make me faithful.

Use spring to break chains, loosen my fingers, settle my heart. It is flesh and not stone, which means it can hurt–

But also that it can heal.