BURST.

The dam finally breaks and you realize, who even cares?? *Chapter 71*

I cannot explain the immense joy decorating my banners over the past few weeks has given me. I fear I am close to a Live, Laugh, Love throw pillow. Hide the Gather signs…

There’s an excerpt from Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic that crosses my mind at least once a week. I always feel a little lame, boring and basic when I cite anything Liz Gilbert or Eat, Pray, Love but I am also not ashamed to admit that I am little bit of all of those things (see banner). Let’s get over it and move on.

I thought by googling ,“Big Magic quote about the wind,” I would easily be able to pull up the passage I’m thinking of, but alas, it eludes me. The same thing happens when I attempt to uncover a part from Eat, Pray, Love when Liz realizes the voice who has been guiding her all along isn’t, in fact, God, but actually her future self, sort of one in the same with God anyway…

ANYWAY… I suppose I can reclaim a sliver of pride realizing that the quotes that resonate most with me aren’t easily google-able.

I AM INTERESTING AND UNIQUE. (insert sobbing emoji)

I Don’t Wanna Grow Up, by Bonnie Lynn Felton, lynnfelton.com

Because googling too hard comes with the threat of distraction, losing all motivation and falling into a procrastination hole full of gigantic crocheted blankets and paint-by-numbers for adults, I’m just gonna paraphrase this idea the way I remember it. If you’ve read Big Magic, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

A poet sits in a field.

*I always picture this famous painting (which CAN be found by simply googling, girl in field painting) when I’m thinking of this quote.

Christina’s World by Andrew Wyeth

Over the hills, a gust of wind begins to blow. The poet takes off running to her house, the wind is her poem. If she doesn’t beat it to her desk, it will whip through her and she will have missed her opportunity to harness it, get it down on paper, make it real.

I can never remember if the metaphor is that of the wind or a train. What’s always enraptured me is the proposal that ideas are entities unto themselves. Fleeting waves that surge or swell or sometimes lull into the mind almost instantly retreating upon arrival.

I’ve overcome the arrogance of believing I can hold onto inspiration. Now risking my REM sleep to flash blue light into my sleepy eyeballs just to jot something into my Notes app at 4am. ‘Hey Siri’ing enough to annoy even my phone, ‘take a note’. Often ideas go on to sit in the void. Jailed in one of my 10,000 online and IRL journals until I’m ready to take them out and look at them.

Lately, many of my friends and the humans I follow online seem to have a adopted a sudden “who even cares” frame of mind. Shockingly, considering the world, it seems to be sprouting from a seed of hope vs despair. Positive bolstering. Ties holding the hot air balloon to the ground released. There’s a Kevin McCallister, I’m not afraid anymore, feeling that seems to be infiltrating creatives. A, who am I holding back for and why would I, vibe.

It’s refreshing. Exhilarating. A train I’m not wasting one minute to board. Suddenly, out of nowhere, it feels like the rain came back and the well’s filled up again. I’m gulping this up after nearly dying of thirst for months. Bursting with inspiration. A sparkling feeling that has somehow come void of judgement.

I’m sick of not doing things because I’m afraid.

Last night, while I was washing my hair, a breeze of an idea for an end-of-year podcast episode nearly blew me over. It took all of my might not to get out of the shower sopping wet, sit on my couch with my microphone and record in only my towel. I at least put a robe on first.

I’ve been pushing down the desire to start a YouTube channel for longer than I want to admit. I find it mortifying still to even type it here. But I keep tripping over the box I’ve been stuffing it away in and so I’ve spent the week filming clips I might turn into my first (if you don’t count my cooking videos) video…

Maybe it’s not that the rain finally came but that what needed to depart at long last evaporated. A weight lifted and a refusal to allow fear to hold the power anymore. Literally, who even cares? Why would I or you, stop ourselves from genuine delight? Even if it’s humiliating and exposing and could very well go nowhere or even worse become a failure.

If we are lucky enough to be given opportunities to take or gifted with ideas to bring forth, it’s our honor and responsibility to do so. Truly. Gratitude for the privilege to create has far overridden any of my judgements about how what I birth will be perceived.

It’s time to get to work. Time to harness the wind of change and inspiration. Time to be true. To ourselves and to the entities of ideas that choose us. We are alive. I don’t know about you but I’m bursting over it. Finally. I’m not afraid anymore.

READING

If you’ve been here for awhile, you’ll know that I’m a huge Maybe Baby fan. Her latest piece on transition and oblivion really struck a cord. Thank you

Haley Nahman

for your truly stunning ability to make sense out of ideas that seem too vast to capture with words. I have no idea how you do it.

My dear friend,

Kerry Whigham

, of The Aspiring Flâneur, writes the most gripping, pleasure-to-read to travel stories. This week he left us hanging with a story about an epic New Zealand trip…I’m almost mad I have to wait to read more.

MAKING

I made this healthy banana bread a few weeks ago because I had no eggs or milk in the house but I did have 4 rotten bananas and a craving. I’ve now made it thrice and it’s become my favorite recipe.

WATCHING

So much YouTube. Around the holidays, all of my favorite creators are posting videos all the time and it’s the coziest, most nostalgic month of binging for me. YouTube is my Bravo.

My last podcast of the year will be released this week or next. I’ve been filming some videos which I may or may not turn into a vlog and I’ve been toiling away at my last gift of the year, my little cookbook, Pretty Easy: All the Recipes I Know by Heart.

I’ve been busy with projects and it feels pretty great. I hope the spark is sparking for you too and, if not, I hope you’re allowing yourself the rest and ease you deserve.

I’m sending you all my warmest wishes for a cozy December.

Talk to you next week.