On Returning After an Unplanned Hiatus and Thanksgiving

Haynes King - The Letter

So here I am -- back from a somewhat involuntary break from blogging and working on getting back into the swing of things. I didn't plan things that way, but I did wind up busier than I needed to be, so I had to make a few judgment calls on the fly. I'm no longer willing to risk burnout or cut into my personal time with my husband to get ungodly amounts of work done, so I decided to simply put a couple of things on hold instead.

Sadly, blogging didn't make the cut as far as my writing life goes, but in retrospect, the break seems to have been good for me. Not only do I feel less poopy about certain things I'd been feeling poopy about, but I'm genuinely excited to get back into the groove after some time away. I've really missed expressing my thoughts this way and interacting with other writers on Medium and across all my social media channels.

As for what I have been up to, I did indeed wind up participating in this year's NaNoWriMo event. And I won, as these days I try to follow through on the writing commitment I make to myself come hell or high water. So that means I have a whole new collection of short stories under my belt -- one for every day in November. 

In April, I'll probably edit it for Camp NaNoWriMo and then begin releasing the stories one by one after that, as that worked out remarkably well last year. In the meantime, I still have plenty of stories leftover from last year's event that still haven't seen the light of day, so I'll still be floating the occasional fiction piece out there in the meantime. 

I've also been really busy with my copywriting business. I started writing marketing-themed content for a new client toward the end of October, and it's been working out really well so far. Not only does he toss me a good amount of work and pay me really well for it, but he eventually invited me to become a credited contributor to his company's blog. That means that although he's still my client and I'm still a hired freelancer, I'm no longer a ghostwriter as far as this particular client is concerned. And I'm stoked about it.

As anyone who's known me or read my stuff for long knows, I've had kind of a love/hate relationship with freelancing, in general, and ghostwriting, in particular when it comes to my writing. On the one hand, I love earning my living doing something like this instead of killing myself behind a cash register or a reception desk somewhere. But I don't always love letting other people take credit for content I worked hard on, especially when that content contains a lot of myself. 

I do occasionally still take one-off assignments about odd topics I don't really care about, but as I've gained experience, I've also niched down quite a lot. Most of the material I write for my regulars these days is on topics that I'm genuinely interested in and knowledgeable about -- like marketing, food, or relationships -- so it's not always easy to just give it away and let someone else take the credit for it. Being given a byline by this new client has really made me feel seen and valued in an exciting new way, so I'll be pursuing more opportunities like that in the future for sure.

........

In other news, my husband and I had a terrific Thanksgiving. Despite being busy the entire month of November, I still managed to take the whole holiday weekend off, which I sorely needed at that point. I made all our usual favorites -- roast turkey, mashed potatoes, sausage-leek stuffing, Brussels sprouts, and gravy to go with it all. I'd been feeling under the weather all week prior to Thanksgiving, so the experience of cooking all that wasn't all that enjoyable, but everything came out delicious. 

We also shared a standard-sized bottle of pinot noir throughout the evening, which was the first alcohol either of us had had in several months. I'm happy to report that that went fine. We both savored our wine instead of guzzling it down to get a buzz as quickly as possible. Neither of us felt the need or desire to drink more after that. No one overdid it or got drunk. Nobody was hungover the next day, either. In other words, it felt like the kind of experience a mentally healthy, well-adjusted couple would have with alcohol, and I'm proud of us both.

Yes, it was a nice treat that made dinner feel festive, but by no means anything I feel the need to do regularly anymore. I'm just done treating my body like garbage and feeling like garbage every day. I don't miss shuffling through my life in a fog, either. But apparently, I can still appreciate a good wine or a nice beer now and again for a special occasion or a holiday. And when alcohol isn't a staple in your life, you can afford to actually buy something decent to enjoy instead of going for the cheapest swill you can find most of the time.

So I suppose November was a month of reflection, exploration, and adjustments for me. Not something I planned on, but something I really seemed to need nevertheless. I suppose that's just how life works out sometimes, and that's part of the beauty of it.