New Things I Now Know

I almost can't believe I made it. I know I missed one day, but I had a good excuse. I was preparing all day for a house full of girlfriends with my sisters and my sister's kids here. And then my sisters and I stayed up till 2AM talking and I was drinking wine and just could not muster the anything to write that night. Still, 30 out of 31 days seems like a huge accomplishment to me, despite that it is nothing in the grand scheme of things. So... what have I learned this month? I had decided to do a what-have-I-learned post based only on my writing, but this has been a really interesting month for me so I'm going to expand that and do a general lessons-learned-in-August-2009 post.

LL1 - I feel cheated out of summer and I hate how much the weather impacts my mood. We had the coolest July on record, followed by an August that, save for about 5 hot and humid days, felt like October. I love, love, love summertime and I have an extreme dislike for being cheated out of it this year. Here's hoping for a great Indian Summer.

LL2 - I have no poker face and should probably work on that. Just today I was in a meeting with several people in a conference room and one person on the phone. The person on the phone was not paying attention and kept interjecting things that didn't apply or asking questions about things that had already been fully explained. I realized half-way through that it was totally obvious to everyone in the meeting that I was half amused, half annoyed at the guy, just by the expressions on my face. I cannot be fake nice or face excited or fake any emotion. There is nothing wrong with being honest, but I should work on not wearing my emotions on my face in such an obvious manner.

LL3 - While writing is pretty much my only 'talent,' forcing myself to do it produces (at best) mixed results. All day I think about what I'm going to write and then I sit down and start writing and often times what shows up on the page is not suitable for posting. Then I get frustrated and post something to fill the spot that may or may not be even worse than what I was originally working on. I have an excess of drafts now that will likely never see the background of my blog. I have many thoughts I have tried to put into words that just seem crazy. I know... it is a little scary that I have things that are even crazier than all the things I've posted this month. I think I'm mostly sane though. For now.

LL4 - While I really want people to read what I write and leave me comments, I am paranoid about putting too much personal information out there. The crazy guy who commented on my post about the creature we had for a short time, still checks that post at least once a day and that really creeps me out. I think it's weird an anonymous person goes around commenting on other people's blogs and then has time to keep going back and checking them every day.

LL5 - Despite that I'm creeped out by trolls, I crave feedback on my work -- on what I can do better, on what is working, on what I should never do again and I wish more people either commented or emailed me about the stuff I write. I try to be all I'm-doing-this-for-my-own-enjoyment, but I guess I really do want to know what people think about the stuff I write. Even if they think it is crap.

LL6 - I think I'm getting better at expressing my thoughts about the things I'm learning. At least in writing. In person is a whole different and scary thing.

I think that is enough for now. I had thought of more earlier in the day, but I didn't have time to write them down and now I've forgotten them. This has been a great exercise for me, but I'm ready for a break. I'm ready for writing from inspiration and not from self-imposed pressure. Thanks to the couple of you who have kept up with my blog this month. I doubt I write tomorrow, but I hope to be back soon with something I'm proud of.