topsy-turvy

oh, hi. remember back at the start of 2020, when i thought i'd reactivate this blog and write more regularly? and how quickly that faded? yeah.

it's been a crazy, chaotic month or so, and to be honest: i just didn't feel like writing. anything. every now and again, i'd get a teeny glimmer of an idea for a blog post, but just felt meh about sitting down to actually get it out. i don't have anything insightful or profound to say on global matters, and writing about frivolous, inconsequential things just seemed... frivolous and inconsequential. so, i just wrote nothing and left the blog to stagnate.

it was also my birthday last week. i'm now less than a year from turning 50. (FIFTY! it's not possible. how can i be almost 50?!?! i feel like i just finished high school. this must be a mistake.)

as most of you know, like christmas, my birthday is always a time of reflection and rumination for me, but this year it felt much deeper and more complex.

my anxiety has been hyper-charged for the past month or so, leaving my brain to gnaw on worrisome thoughts as i fall asleep each night, and causing me to wake up feeling panicked around 5am each day. it's sucked my motivation to do anything creative all but dry -- even taking photos for the photo blog has been challenging. tossing my annual birthday musing into this stress cocktail just left me feeling spun in a suffocating vortex of regret (over the past) and worry (about the future).

on my actual birthday, i went to my parents' house for presents, cake and a socially distanced lunch. while there, i went up to my bedroom and started going through boxes of childhood stuff that i'd packed away years ago. and as i looked through decades-old memorabilia and birthday cards and mementos from family vacations, i was reminded of the person i was and the person i thought i would become. as a kid and a teen, i was so hugely passionate about movies and TV and screenwriting, and making a name for myself in the entertainment industry. practically every single thing i unearthed in those boxes was connected to that long-faded dream. long-faded plan, actually.

it was bittersweet. yes, i've led a good life and had assorted accomplishments and all that stuff, but i started to think about where my life might have ended up if i'd been less fearful, less nervous, less uncertain and more confident. what if i'd truly pursued my dream instead of deferring it for easier, less scary, less risky professional pursuits? i thought about how many projects i could have completed in my 20s, 30s and 40s, and wondered if there was even any point in starting any projects at this point in my life. (i mean, yes, of course there's a point and there's no reason to throw out ambition or hopes or dreams, even 30 years later -- but my head was in a negative space around my birthday.) the COVID-19 situation has added an extra layer of regret because i think, "dammit. what if that window of opportunity is now forever closed?"

anyway, you get the idea. there's been a lot of woulda-, coulda-, shoulda-ing this past week, and i'm still trying to wade out of that mire to get myself back on some kind of creative track.

in related news, all of the above has been in conjunction with a fair amount of (growing) anxiety over the future. what growing old will be like for me. will i be alone forever? i start worrying about my mom, too. when i'm 50, she'll be 80... and realizing that makes me fearful over how many years we might have left together. will she still be here in 11 years when i turn 60? what about when i turn 55? maybe (her mother lived to 90), maybe not. this is the math that frequently creeps into my consciousness as i'm trying to get to sleep. and will we ever get back to florida? who knows.

need more? here's more! i've also been worrying about my income, or lack thereof. yes, i have a year's salary saved (yay!) and just finished a six-week assignment that helped put some $$ back in the bank (also yay!), which means i don't have to stress too much right now. but i'm a planner and like to think far ahead. so i'm already looking towards 2021. and 2022. will i be able to find work? when? from whom? doing what? if i can't get a freelance-writing gig, what will i do?

and that all circles back to the childhood dreams of writing movies and TV shows. THAT can be a lucrative career, but it's suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuper-hard to succeed. if i could write a great screenplay or teleplay -- or even book -- and get it sold, that's a year's salary right there! but it's a gigantic "if."

the inertia of the past several weeks has (thankfully) been punctuated by fleeting moments of "no, wait, i CAN do this! i CAN get something amazing written! i'm gonna start tomorrow! tomorrow's gonna be the day i get back on track and get writing!"

but many tomorrows have come and gone, and not a word was writ.

until today.

because i knew that i would keep coming up with excuses not to write, or not to get back on the creativity horse, unless i actually WROTE SOMETHING.

my goal for today was small and simple: write something for the blog. just sit down and write. so here i am.

and, hopefully, this will act as a micro-defibrillator for the part of my brain that oversees creativity and words and writing, getting those neurons and pathways fired up and running again... which, in turn, will hopefully spur more writing, which will beget more writing... and so on.

your TL;DR takeaway for this long, rambling, directionless word salad: i gotta get writing again, and this blog post is step one.

i gotta get back to those three screenplay outlines i wrote at the start of 2020 and get at least one of them turned into an actual script before december 31st. i'm putting it out there (well, out here) in the hopes of making it happen by sharing it. willing it into existence. or, at least, willing myself into action. please feel free to harass me on occasion and ask how they're going -- being accountable to others always makes me much more productive and motivated than i would otherwise be if i were only accountable to myself.

to me, getting back on that writing horse, especially with all this virus-induced social distancing and excessive amounts of time to work on something meaningful, might help calm some of the anxiety. alleviate some of the regret. ease some of the worry.

i think i owe it to myself to make a better, more concerted effort. i certainly owe it to my younger self. and the self i'm gonna be next year at this time. when i'm 50. (FIFTY!)