Back again with more random thoughts. Let’s do this.
Watching: I keep seeing recommendations for Rutherford Falls (Peacock) everywhere, so I decided to give it a try. I can’t say I’m hooked after just the first episode but I’m intrigued… it’s been compared to Parks & Rec and Ted Lasso, so I’m planning to keep watching.
Listening: Oh boy… this one is a journey. We’re talking three two-hour-long episodes kind of journey. But if you’ve even peripherally heard about Rachel Hollis or book Girl, Wash Your Face… you’ll probably want to listen to the Be There in Five podcast deep dive on Rachel Hollis and the Rose-Colored Glass Ceiling.
Reading: Still slowly working through Braiding Sweetgrass and The Moment of Lift. I’m not a slow reader but finding the time to read, especially deep thoughtful non-fiction that doesn’t just make me want to drop everything and binge-read it over a weekend, is just tough for me right now.
Crafting: Nothing new on the crafting front either. I forgot how much brain-space a knitting pattern that you actually have to follow along with can take up!
Planning: Normally in this section I talk about fun stuff I have coming up… but today I’m going to put in a plug for the Hobonichi Cousin planner. I’ve used a daily planner for a long time but they can be so thick that it’s just awkward to carry around. Hobonichi uses this special super-thin Tomoe River paper that manages to get daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly layouts all in one book that’s not much thicker than your average paperback.
Thinking about: Summer. Since Memorial Day is just a few weeks away, I’ve started to notice this weird feeling creeping in that seems to happen to me every summer. It’s the feeling that other people are having more fun than me, especially on summer holidays, when it seems like everyone in my area is headed to “the Lake” (which actually could be any one of several lakes, but mostly Table Rock Lake) to go boating and spend time at their lake house; sun & fun ensue. (From what I can tell, most of the people my age don’t actually own lake houses, but someone in their family does.)
Anyway - I don’t have access to a lake house, and I don’t really like spending all day in the sun, so what is up with this weird FOMO I get for something I don’t even want to do? This, layered on top of my standard summer mom guilt (oh my poor children who must suffer through “boring camps” and summer school since I work full time), and feeling unexcited about my middle-age bod in a swimsuit… all adds up to me feeling twisted up in knots a good part of the summer.
Anyone have words of wisdom for me? Help a girl out. And thanks for reading.
I feel that summer FOMO sometimes, too. But I think that one thing Covid gave me was less guilt/shame about how I choose to fill my time. When everyone had to be doing their own thing because no one could depend on anyone else to give them a social life, I was really able to see how I actually like to fill my calendar. And going forward I will be home a whole lot more. I like my books and my garden and my walks and my baking projects. It doesn’t mean I’m not thrilled to be seeing my friends again. But that ability to see more clearly what I do and don’t want to be doing feels like a much smoother process now that I had some practice in a social vacuum. You do you...and don’t apologize. 🙂 You can’t miss out on what you don’t really want to be doing in the first place.