Dear Friends,
I got busy this morning, not intentionally, and started the big fall cleaning.
What prompted me? I had planned to spend the entirety of the morning working on the three books I'm studying my way through. I shared what those were a few weeks ago and I'm trying to do something in each of them every single day. Until I miss a day which somehow becomes two, three, four days, and I have to hunker down.
And to think that just yesterday I'd told Sam that in school I would never put off any project work but get started right away on it because I loathed the anxiety that comes with putting off major work until the last minute.
Yep. Just look at me. The study work isn't the issue. It's the fall cleaning. I knew when I posted what I wanted to get that done this month that I needed to start right away...Here it is more than halfway through the month, and I have only just got started. But remember I told you all, that I never leave anything unfinished once I start it. Now I will get the jobs done.
What finally got me started? I was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking at the same layer of dust on my dresser that prompted me to think I needed to do Fall cleaning come September way back at the end of August while I was mulling my goals for the coming month. It had gotten thicker.
So naturally I got up and cleaned the bathroom because, you know, avoidance is always the best start to any major work, right?
Well, I did the bathroom up proper. I dusted walls, pictures, mopped, cleaned everything. Then I walked into the bedroom and started the task of deep cleaning that room. I won't tell you I'm through in either room, but I'm close. I deep dusted the bedroom, including the wall, door, pictures, curtains. I cleaned under the bed and all the furniture. I vacuumed all along the carpet edges in that little crevice between the wall and floor where dust collect. I cleaned the blinds.
You might well ask, "Terri, what else is there to do?" Using lemon oil on all the antique furniture (the room is full of antique furniture) and cleaning the windows in the bedroom and bathroom. Then I can move on to cleaning the living room, dining room, entry ways, laundry and the bulk of the kitchen, the entire guest bedroom and bathroom, the siding on the front of the house and the back of it as well...Oh there's loads more to be done.
Since cleaning for three hours straight can't possibly be enough work, I decided to sweep and mop the kitchen and clean the kitchen rug, as a bonus finish while I thawed ham in the oven for sandwiches for or lunch.
All of that done, even though I had yet to clean up the kitchen from two days ago.
Nope, not in two days. I'm not a perfect housekeeper but I do generally try to keep things neat. You'd never have known that was true if you'd walked into my home this morning. Four days of being gone most of the day after, had taken a toll on this household, that's for sure.
Working at something like cleaning is always a good time to do some thinking. Driving works as thinking time, as does sitting in a parking lot at the doctor's office for a few hours. I've done a lot of thinking the past few weeks. I started back in August. I've thought about this stage of life, about this blog, about what I think I want my life to look like from this point onward, about what I want to accomplish (news flash it's not all about cleaning and ambition is not dead!), about living in a way that makes me feel authentic.
By authentic, I mean a whole person that is true to who she was created to be. I've spent a lot of my life living as I thought I 'ought to' or how others felt I should be, but I was created by God to be myself. Not my neighbor, not my seatmate at church and not the woman on the latest vlog or Instagram that wants to tell me why I'm not who she thinks I ought to be.
This blog is not an authentic place for me anymore. I have run this race and gone as far as I can possibly go with it. I said years ago that I had done all I knew to do to save money and now it was a matter of refreshing old skill and learning new ones. At this time in my life, I've gone as far as I want to go. 'Want to' is not equal to 'have to' but right now I have the ability to base life on the 'want to' platform. I am well aware that may change.
My prayer 30 years ago was for God to help me find inspiration to write. What I knew then was how to be a mama, a homemaker, a wife who lived, who had always lived, on a very tight budget. God dropped the name "Penny Ann Poundwise" into my mind and the next morning; I got up and started writing. I began with a Yahoo groups newsletter, then moved to Xanga, and when I found Xanga offensive with their ads, I came to blogger. I was able to write for a few privately published magazines, earned a little money along the way, all based on what I knew. I was true all these years to the inspiration God gave me.
I wanted to move away from Penny Ann Poundwise, and found that because I had started on this platform under the same premise, I was 'stuck'. Not a perfect persona but a person, true to life and flawed, but still with that same point of view which was always first and foremost the focus of the bulk of my writing, living well on a budget. But this season has ended.
Frankly I knew it was drawing to a close at least two ago, but I allowed the bit of money I make here to be my reason for continuing on. I admit that many times, I sat down and wrote and knew in my heart of hearts that if I deleted the whole of it, I'd have done all of us a favor. It wasn't good writing, it wasn't purpose led, it wasn't worth the time I put into it, nor yours in reading it.
Well, God will direct our steps, won't he? I was allowed to bring a portion of my writing out into the public. The payment I received for the blog work, small as it was, dwindled to a lot less. I'm not complaining. I'm explaining how God has worked and directed my steps in the past year or so. If my reason to continue here was merely money, then God pretty much made that a non-excuse any longer.
As I came into summer this year, I was planning to be hyper focused here on this blog. I was going to push hard to write more and better. I was going to figure out more ways to earn. I was going to figure out how to increase readership. I meant I was going to make this work.
Then I paid a visit to Katie in June, the day before she started a job. She was excited about her future. I was not so much excited about mine as determined. The next day she called me in tears. "My sitter just quit...And I really need this job! What do I do? I've called around about childcare and no one has an opening. I asked how much it would cost for three when they did have openings and Mama, I can't make that much."
I knew in that moment that my plans were changed. Quite unlike the past when I balked and ranted and fussed and then did it anyway when it came to giving up my time for childcare, this time I felt total and complete peace about it. I let go of all my plans and all my expectations and went to where I felt God had called me to go. A door had shut. Gently. But firmly. Bonus, Katie was able to pay me a portion for my time. It was a help to us over a season that is typically tight for us.
I've tried to pick up the pace with writing after July, but from the time I was able to focus on this blog once more, I've had to fight myself. All through August, I struggled and prayed. More and more I was convinced that it was time to let go.
I'm done with the wrestling of making time to post daily. I'm done with trying to figure out the angle to making money so I can justify continuing. I'm done with it being hard and dry work. And too often sub-par work. I'm done feeling no inspiration at all and coughing up dust.
I am not done writing. No, nor in sharing what I write either. I'm just done with the sort of writing I've been doing for the past twenty-eight years.
I want to sit down inspired and get up from the computer knowing that what I've written is worthwhile. I want to feel the fire of needing to write. I want to wake up finding I have something to say. I want to have fun while writing. Because it is fun when the words flow and you know without a doubt that the inspiration was true, and words fall fluidly across the page. I want to read what I've written and recognize my voice as a true one. Authentic.
I won't come here to write anymore. I won't be publishing five times a week. I won't be writing about saving money. I won't share about keeping house. I won't be writing about making meals. All those things will go on in real life, but I'm done writing about it. It's time to acknowledge that this season is at an end.
I want to try new things. And to pick up old things I set aside because I had no time for them or forgot that it was part of what made life pleasurable. I want to explore different ways of sharing what I write.
I plan to start a new blog, something different than this one. It might come to naught in the end, but I'm going to need some place to write for a bit and I know this format is user friendly. At the end of this week, I'll share the new blog address with you and if you'd care to come along and see where this new journey takes me then you'll be welcomed. I'll let this blog stand for a time because it might continue to help and serve others but posting here will cease after this Friday.
Thank you all for your kindness, your gifts, comments, friendships, and sharing of your lives with me. I appreciate you all so much.
Love,
Terri
