I’m glad I didn’t write this summer, kind of

Photo by Julia M Cameron on Pexels.com

A fellow blogger reacted with surprise when I posted this morning. They have been thinking about not writing, and felt justified because I hadn’t posted in over two months. I checked and it’s true; my last post was in June.

I don’t feel any shame in not posting, nor should they, nor do I feel shame in repeating words in this sentence and adding all those negatives. No one should beat themselves up over “I wish I had” this year. I wish I had written something over the summer. I did, but I never shared it here.

This is what I did instead, listed in no particular order:

• I taught English online full-time for the month of July. My days were full, 8-hour days and there was no desire to sit in front of a computer any longer.
• except I did sit in front of a computer for additional time from July 1-13 because I was preparing for my comprehensive exam; I passed 🙂
• I spent August not working. I haven’t had a break from work/school collectively in two years.
• I nagged my kids.
• I watched TikToks.
• I baked. A lot.
• I rented a cottage for 12 days. I read downloaded magazines. I cycled. I ran. I walked the beach and looked for sea glass. I did not read any books. I helped the neighbour next door move rocks. I sneezed because allergies.
• I organized parts of my basement.
• I put things away in the house that had been growing into teetering piles.
• Some amazing friends came over for a dinner outside. We sent our collective messages via WhatsApp to another friend who was 8 hours ahead of us and sleeping. She woke up and voice messaged us back.
• I cycled along Lakeshore.
• I met a colleague from work and went for a walk.
• My friend in the city had me over for dinner twice; once to celebrate my candidacy, and once to host an intimate dinner for a few of her friends. The garden, the food, the company surpassed expectations both times. I have now added almond and chevre-filled dates to my appetizer repertoire, and you should, too.
• I took the fam to the dentist.
• I cycled the Niagara Parkway, all of it, from Niagara-on-the-Lake to past The Falls and back three weekends in a row (the ride is 60+km). And I dined al fresco at wineries after each ride.
• I did a lot of other things that I’m not going to tell you about.

My writing has suffered because I pushed it aside (look at those bullets — where is the parallelism???), but I regained something I had forgotten about. I remembered what my summers used to be like before I became a grad student. I had time to kill in August. What a gift.

Relaxing on a hammock in my garden