ROW80 - Life Happens

Mom with her friend/caregiver wearing the crocheted tunics I made them

A lot of mental bandwidth as well as time messaging back and forth with family has been commandeered by the ongoing events around Mom's stroke.  She is still in the hospital for at least another day but they are already warning us that the insurance could come back with denial of further hospital stay any day.  They still haven't decided whether they are going to send her to in-patient rehab before sending her home.  They say she isn't exhibiting enough stamina for it.  But as of yesterday she still needed two people to assist her in transferring in and out of bed and chairs.  I can't imagine how that is going to work at home going forward. But the other option is worse in the new reality.  If she has to go to another living situation the rules for most of them don't allow visitors.  Please pray for her and our family.

Meanwhile, to help me keep my mind from zooming race-track circles I continued the sort project.  This is also something I could be doing to contribute to the new reality as my stuff has been overrunning Mom's room.

So it is to some extent understandable that I haven't met all of my writing goals this week.  But on the other hand, journaling is something that would help this situation and yet I've been avoiding it.  I did manage to get the poem collection project started.  And I did open the journal file today.  Since one of my issues is initiating, I need to give myself some points for both of those things but there is no way I can call it satisfactory.  At least I'm not entertaining ideas of giving up 'because I've already failed' as I once would have.

A Round of Words in 80 Days
Round 3 2020

The writing challenge that
 knows you have a life

Camp NaNoWriMo July 2020

2020 Round 3 ROW80 and July Camp NaNo goals check-in:

* Sleep 7.5 hours Daily Minimum --  Unsatisfactory

* Move/Breathe/Meditate 15 min Daily minimum  -- Satisfactory effort

* Storydreaming with note-taking tools at hand. 15 min Daily MInimum -- This is a technique I learned from Robert Olen Butler in the book From Where You Dream. -- Unsatisfactory

* Read Fiction 30 min Daily Average --  Above and beyond

* Read/Study Craft 15 min Daily Average --  Above and beyond

* Social network activities 30 min Daily Minimum (writing Joystory posts doesn't count only social reaching out like reading/commenting on other blogs, guest posts and posting to fb, twitter, pinterest etc) -- something I've a strong resistance to.  --  Above and beyond

* 30 min Daily minimum engagement with a scavenger hunt though all my creative writing files including Joystory looking for better than shitty first draft scenes, sections, stories, poems and essays and edit, organize and make hard copies. --  Unsatisfactory

* To prep for self-pub: Gather all my poems into a single Scrivener file. Minimum one poem per day until all accounted for.  Adding new ones encouraged. --   Satisfactory

* Personal Journaling 45 min or 1000 words whichever come first Daily Minimum -- This is the heart of the writing challenge.  The preceding provides the structure and the nutrients that nurtures and honors the work which I've learned over time must exist to ensure that this becomes more than just dabbling.  --  Unsatisfactory

Sorta Sorted

This is the sort project on Mom's bed as of Sunday.  I don't want to take time to take, edit and upload a pic of what it looks like today but it is now a full layer deeper and part of a third as I left the nine 11 gallon Ziploc zipper bags in place and spread more boxes and bags over them to sort.  It was easier on my back to have the added height.  Since Sunday I've sorted through at least another dozen boxes and bags, eliminating at least 50% of their volume.  I have several more empty boxes and bags to show for it.

I'm getting better and better at letting go.  The sort project has become my therapy as it is helping me sort my mental and emotional stuff as I sort my physical objects.  And it is giving me something to OCD on to replace the tendency to OCD on Ed.  I've nearly broken the habit of keeping a running narrative in my head of all the things I plan to share with him in our next chat.  I've nearly reached peace with the understanding there will be no more 'chats' no more casual sharing of thoughts and emotions, pitfalls and triumphs.  Future communication will be utilitarian for the purpose of separating our respective belongings and proceeding with the legal divorce.

For an explanation and links to backstory see the ROW80/Camp NaNo Goals post.