taking stock | 5 & 10 years
I always feel like this blog (journals or diaries in general) are an excellent way to re-read and get a sense of what was happening in your life at any given moment. I had some time today to take a scan back at 5 and 10 years ago and I feel like so many of the running threads in my life are always present. Five years ago, I was about to get a nasty bout of food poising, but also, three unruly kittens, only one of which I would keep, but another which I would later re-home. I was obsessed with embracing summer and spending enough time enjoying it. I was at the beginning of a relationship that would only last a few months, but was fairly low drama, and also ending another long-term one that would re-surface, then end finally that fall. I was working on some book projects like lunarium and ghost landscapes
Ten years ago, I appear to have been doing a whole lot of readings, one after the other--Woodland Pattern, the Bookslut Series, Brother's K in Evanston. I was knee deep in the etsy shop madness, making soaps and photographing so much vintage. I was working on a collaborative postcard project with another author, but there isn't much mention of actual writing projects, which makes sense since I was still in my post-MFA burnout stage. The trickle would not start until a year or two later with the James Franco piecs. I do note a couple of publications, but they seem to be older work from before. Romantically, I was back in a relationship after some unfortunate circumstances, but caught up in some weird euphoria that would carry it through the next year or so before things went nuclear. Despite this, there are so many mentions of being ecstatically happy and content, and I truly believe I was, possibly in a way that seems strangely unattainable sense, even though I consider myself a pretty happy person in general, no matter what.
The past couple of years, I've found myself struggling to get back there, but I'm not sure where there was, and reading those old entries may get me closer, but also somehow, farther away. But good, mild weather helps. Dresses and tacos and poetry helps. Good, functional relationships and an apartment full of cats help. I'm, as always, struggling to keep up, but am determined to enjoy summer just as much as I was years ago.
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