Open Brain, Empty Contents
I’ve opened and re-opened the New Post page on my website more times than I care to count. It’s bled into other writing as well. I sit before a screen or paper and nothing comes out. Not even doodles. I dragged out paints to get my creativity going and dabbed some blobs until it was all muddied and dried out.
This past year seems to have either inspired people to buckle down and create themselves a better life or become frayed at all the edges until there’s barely anything left. Even those privileged enough to retain jobs and homes found themselves doing tasks they weren’t used to from helping their kids in school to home haircuts and baking bread. Some of it was out of boredom, experimentation, or feel part of the group. Some of it was necessity. Sometimes the line blurred.
I sat, sanding old dip powder off my nails with a small pink power tool, listening to The Steal Like an Artist trilogy on theLibro.fm app. Kleon is talking about staying an amateur, keeping one’s passion. I’ve definitely remained an amateur at doing my nails, though I’m improving. I’ve been improving my teaching craft as well, but none of my actual arts.
That field has been left fallow so long it remains to be seen if anything can still grow in the soil. How does one grow a garden of art again? Perhaps the pandemic gardeners have advice? Which reminds me that I’ve been looking for a box of seeds I misplaced in my house at least a year ago. I’m not sure how a carved wooden box disappears, but it’s done it. Were those the seeds that make art? Were those the seeds that know how to turn loosely-formed ideas into a proper plot? If I recall they were just things like radishes and carrots, but nourishment is nourishment.
One thing I have learned this past year is how much of a lie “we all have the same twenty-four hours” really is. Someone spending their every waking moment collecting take-out from various places and dropping off tacos and sushi all over the city in an effort to keep living indoors does not have the same twenty-four hours as someone getting paid a handsome salary to attend Zoom meetings and answer emails.
Even that argument rings hollow, though, doesn’t it?
A writer tapping away at their novel on a phone while waiting for the side of fries, thinking about their story and what comes next as they let an app lead them through neighborhoods, and tapping out the next sentence before a new order pops up is using those twenty-four hours to their max. The middle manager keeping a toddler on-task during meetings and replying to emails while stuffing laundry into the washer may not have the mental capacity to do more than collapse at the end of the night.
No one ever imagined how exhausting Zoom could be. Even my extroverted husband was wiped out after spending all day in an on-camera training class. By the end of a day of classes, my introverted self is, at best a marshmallow.
Responsibility is another great drain. Worrying that the bills won’t get paid eats up brain space for stories and drawings and songs. And as article after article has pointed out, the mental load women have been carrying the past year has largely been greater than men.
During this past year, I’ve struggled with learning to do things I had gotten used to paying others for, like my nails and cutting my husband’s hair, but I also got used to paying others to do things I used to do, like wandering around in the grocery store looking for tofu and vegan cheese. I spent months at the husband’s bedside when he was in the hospital, but now that he’s able to walk and work (and hike and lift weights) again, he’s so thankful for the ability to move, he’s started making breakfast and swapping out laundry.
Which means if I can maintain some balance in the rest of my life, my brain should start to have things in it besides factoring trinomials and inverse variation. So, I’m going to challenge myself to try writing something every day this month. We’ll see how I do because ADHD and follow-through don’t always play well together. But that’s a topic for another day.
