Half-Past Eight PM: Back you cannot go

By the numbering scheme we are actually well past "Half-Past Eight PM" but you had to know I was going to make a point to get it in there. I've been antsy about getting another post up for the last few weeks, maybe not because I had anything important to say but because, well, I wanted to. And maybe I felt a little bit bad that I didn't feel like I had much to say. Not that I should be shocked that I went a month without posting here -- that's minor, that's common. I guess I'm just being annoyed at being stopped up and not feeling like I have either the time for all the things I want to do, nor the material if I did have time.

I don't even really have time right now. It's Saturday morning and I'm a little grumpy because I slept late, because we were up late. And I really think we were only up late because Mel had some pop with dinner and was having fun with Instagram reels until 2 AM and I had already been falling asleep on the couch, and there was a whole... well, I don't want to say argument, but there was a slight clash over that. We actually got through it with talking. I talked a bit about how I've been feeling down lately and I can't quite put my finger on why, which is true, sort of. There's this nebulous "time is passing by" pressure, this "world on my shoulders" pressure. It's getting colder and I always get down at this time of year -- I told Rebecca our trainer of all people, when we were waiting for Mel to get ready -- it just puts me in a really grim state of mind. The shortening of days, the winter chill. I look out at the garden and I feel bad because I didn't trim it back properly in time because we were running all over trying to do other stuff -- and I don't mean what we did in October, I mean what we've done since. Feels like every weekend has been booked up. And mostly it's been nice, don't get me wrong -- we've had some weekends where we just do our running around and we're in a car together listening to music going from place to place and it's very fun and freeing, but then I get home and I see evidence of my thing of always having someone else's needs before mine -- and they're not even particularly selfish needs like doing the garden -- but it still weighs. It's a lil messed up.

We were deep-cleaning the house last weekend which is always tough for me because I have to be on standby to advise Mel and then get assigned tasks to support her instead of doing the part I wanted to focus on. I would love to be the people who takes the kitchen back to 0 at the end of the night before bed, just give me a bit of time, but we don't make time so it gets messy and stays messy and then even when I try to clean it it remains messy. I could be cleaning it right now but weekend mornings are "my time" and I really hold that sacred and I don't like trying to fill them with chores. And plus the late start for today already has me on edge.

This is not overall a very positive post, but it is an accurate reflection of where I'm at.

Ultimately, there's nothing dramatic or insurmountable about my feelings, I just have these little things weighing on me, and when I get negative comments about how things are supposed to be, but I know I'm not the reason those things aren't that way, I take it personally. But then I'm so drained I don't have the energy to correct the things I recognize need correcting. I'm in a bit of a cycle here.

Like I said, it's been busy. We had Halloween and Eric's birthday. We put up the tree almost immediately afterward, which is not my preference, but c'est la vie. We have had a lot of running around to do. One weekend we went to Oakville to pick up some Squishmallow ornaments Mel had bought on Marketplace, picking them up in a parking lot at Wyecroft and Bronte. We were going to go to Cora's for breakfast afterward in Oakville, but when we got there we found out they had closed that one down so we had to double back to Burlington, which ended up being a nice little breakie anyway. We've seen a lot of Mel's parents lately for various reasons: pumpkin carving, tree decorating, putting up our lights last weekend and Nonna's this weekend. We went to church two weekends ago because it was the week to say Papa's name, but Nonna was too sick to go; she's only just not getting better.

There's war in the middle east, which has been a lot to learn about. 

I've grappled with a lack of inspiration and motivation for my personal projects and feeling financial pressure, and also I guess I have a dayjob?? That they expect me to do all day during the week?? Weird.

There was some stuff there with people being let go. Not a huge amount of it hit our team -- only one person (which is still unfortunate) and that there were vacancies now not being filled which required some slight re-alignments of duties, although that didn't hit me too hard, so I'm satisfied. You hate to see people go. Selfishly, there was one area where I thought, "Really, they didn't see any redundancies with you all?" But I guess it is what it is. The reduction in big jobs only galvanizes my point that there isn't probably another job for me at Indigo. Our Financial advisor mentioned I should try to get on with some recruiting agencies, and I'm open to it, I just haven't taken the initiative.

I'm trying to write a book. Actually I'm trying to write three books, but only one of them I would sign my name to.

If I could put my mind now, with all my lived experience, back into my younger carefree self, I would be a force. I didn't write more when I had time because I doubted myself because I didn't feel like I had developed enough, and the truth is, I hadn't. I couldn't have done what I do now much earlier.

I think I've unpoured myself as much as I mean to today.

Last night's talk, by the way, ended up with a lot of hugging and crying and kissing. I think we're going to be okay. It was cathartic, although I still feel like it's partly unresolved.

Unresolved is the story of our life.

But there is love.

Keep on rockin'

-Scotto