Blogger's Block Pt.2: Pinpointing the Cause
We went for a walk the other evening...the sun was setting and I was feeling chatty as per usual.
I'm wired something like a guy: I process stuff when I'm in motion, so walking around the pond at Mt. Holyoke College is a good thing for me. Lots of stuff bubbles to the surface, and comes out, and then there's some "Eureka!" moment.
There was much pissing and moaning that I can't seem to find the right stories to blog about, that I can't seem to find the motivation to write *anything,* let alone pitch a story....and I hate being freelance because it very much quite often puts me in a state of economic free-fall...
and then it hit me!
Economic insecurity's got everything other than personal blogging totally blocked up!
oh, but what to do about it...
Over the weekend I went down to New Jersey to visit my Father...
On Sunday, it was a standard visit. He talked about himself, what he's doing for my sister (I politely told him I did not want to hear it), and how bored and lonely he is...
Very little asked about me and what I'm doing.
We then took a trip to Princeton. I wanted to show Steady Eddie where I worked 20 years ago--when I started my non-profit finance career that ended up being part of the stress that drove me into chronic fatigue...
It's odd--looking back on my Princeton days, I realize that the stress of the job--being locked in a career that wasn't a good fit-- was only part of what drove me bonkers. There was more. There was PTSD from my family situation. There was a bad marriage. The job was a contributing factor--some strange things happened there, and some good things...So, it wasn't the whole chronic fatigue enchilada....
When we got to NJ on Saturday, we stopped at the Menlo Park Mall. We looked at shoes in Macy's and Steady Eddie offered to buy me a pair of pretty, soft leather $89 pumps because the summer shoes I was wearing the other day made blisters on the side of my feet...
I told him no, I really didn't need a pair of $89 shoes. And smiled that he thought they would make me happy...
Yet when I put the shoes together with Princeton and with my current economically unstable situation, I got to thinking: how much longer can I play around here? Maybe what I really need to do is stop thinking that one more round of college--masters or ph.d.--is going to create a good job for me. Maybe I need really want to have a good salary and benefits and a credit rating. Maybe I want to have a job, a place in the world, where I might need to wear a pair of $89 shoes and that my boyfriend buying them for me wasn't because I couldn't afford them for myself.
Maybe there's no glory in struggling out here...
So, I am thinking there's more to this than simply running out of ideas. Maybe it's really a desire for economic security and stability.
Maybe so.
So, now what?
I'm wired something like a guy: I process stuff when I'm in motion, so walking around the pond at Mt. Holyoke College is a good thing for me. Lots of stuff bubbles to the surface, and comes out, and then there's some "Eureka!" moment.
There was much pissing and moaning that I can't seem to find the right stories to blog about, that I can't seem to find the motivation to write *anything,* let alone pitch a story....and I hate being freelance because it very much quite often puts me in a state of economic free-fall...
and then it hit me!
Economic insecurity's got everything other than personal blogging totally blocked up!
oh, but what to do about it...
Over the weekend I went down to New Jersey to visit my Father...
On Sunday, it was a standard visit. He talked about himself, what he's doing for my sister (I politely told him I did not want to hear it), and how bored and lonely he is...
Very little asked about me and what I'm doing.
We then took a trip to Princeton. I wanted to show Steady Eddie where I worked 20 years ago--when I started my non-profit finance career that ended up being part of the stress that drove me into chronic fatigue...
It's odd--looking back on my Princeton days, I realize that the stress of the job--being locked in a career that wasn't a good fit-- was only part of what drove me bonkers. There was more. There was PTSD from my family situation. There was a bad marriage. The job was a contributing factor--some strange things happened there, and some good things...So, it wasn't the whole chronic fatigue enchilada....
When we got to NJ on Saturday, we stopped at the Menlo Park Mall. We looked at shoes in Macy's and Steady Eddie offered to buy me a pair of pretty, soft leather $89 pumps because the summer shoes I was wearing the other day made blisters on the side of my feet...
I told him no, I really didn't need a pair of $89 shoes. And smiled that he thought they would make me happy...
Yet when I put the shoes together with Princeton and with my current economically unstable situation, I got to thinking: how much longer can I play around here? Maybe what I really need to do is stop thinking that one more round of college--masters or ph.d.--is going to create a good job for me. Maybe I need really want to have a good salary and benefits and a credit rating. Maybe I want to have a job, a place in the world, where I might need to wear a pair of $89 shoes and that my boyfriend buying them for me wasn't because I couldn't afford them for myself.
Maybe there's no glory in struggling out here...
So, I am thinking there's more to this than simply running out of ideas. Maybe it's really a desire for economic security and stability.
Maybe so.
So, now what?
posted by Tish Grier at 6:40 PM
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