Checking in

I mean to be posting more, but I have to be honest, I'm spending so much time enjoying my life more that it hasn't been a priority.  I have been writing letters to friends and family.  I have been taking my dog for walks.  I eat lunch with my husband every day (often lunches I have master-chef-ed out of food from the pantry).  I knit and sew and clean and cook.  I draw.  Oh I draw and draw and draw and draw.

I'm also doing some temporary contract work--such a gift.  It doesn't take loads and loads of brain power, but I can do the work at home on my schedule and it's the kind of work I could keep doing once there's a wee person in the house.  Extra cash to make money feel not quite so tight on one salary.  Thank you, Jess, for thinking of me for this.  It was the last piece of the puzzle that makes all of this feel better than okay.

And now there's a word that I've decided I'm going to try to get out of my vocabulary: should.  It's this word that I think I use in a guilty way, as in I am enjoying doing X, but I really should be doing Y.  Or I am making this big life decision because it's what I should do.  But the second I say "should," I know that there's a better voice inside of me that's saying, "don't do it!"  "Should" literally is the word my brain uses to say, "now I have to give up something I like to do for something I truly don't want to do." Why do I do this to myself?

So here are some pictures of my past week:

office clean up.  threw out several bags of garbage.  I'm a pack rat.

but now my office is clean and lovely.  Still.  A week and half later.

Our dog L.P. is sending emails to my niece and nephew. If they get mail, they get to read it out loud in front of their preschool class.  Now that I know that, those kids are getting some mail.

Sometimes, just riding the train with friends is fun. . . 

but it's also nice when there is a baseball game at the end of the ride.

The garden is starting to take care of itself.  Less planting this year.  All the hard work has paid off!

Columbia College Chicago's end of the year arts celebration: Manifest!  A giant art party--who cares if it rained, the art was still brilliant.

These are the kinds of things I should be doing, so I am.  It helps that Dan supports this brief period of discovery and starting over.  I may never be able to repay him for this, but I will love him deeply and  long.