No, I haven’t gotten any better at juggling my life, thank you for asking. Perhaps quite the opposite, but life does carry on as usual in it’s fascinating chaos. Over the many, many months that have passed, I was struck with the inability to write. The dreaded Writer’s Block. Actually, scratch that. I kept writing. My Gmail inbox is full of weird drafts of half-finished thoughts all entitled “(no subject).” Don’t worry, dear reader, all these embarrassing musings will all see the light of day soon. One of my favorite artists, Emily McDowell, has an accurate depiction of what the creative process looks like:

        Endless loops of “I have no ideas, and I hate everything” coupled with the ever-present “you’re totally ridiculous and no one wants to hear what you have to say.” But, these things happen, and that’s ok.

        Sometimes you have to be ok with not being ok and just sit in that in a while, as un-fun as it is. For me, the hardest thing is simply having to admit when things aren’t going well. This is especially hard in this social media, oversharing, humble-bragging age when everyone is up to their eyeballs in everyone else’s business.  Everyone is just trying to market themselves in a way that looks good to everyone else, and no one puts anything real out there. A good friend of mine recently told me that she thinks that I just might be too good at being “fine.” When people ask me how my day is going, sometimes they get a “It’s goooooood” with an odd, lilting intonation. The word “good” should never be squeezed out of you. If I do this to you, what it really means is “OMG, I’m keeping it together. I’m here and I have clothes on, so it can’t be that bad, right? Except my brain is telling me that the walls are on fire and the ceiling is on fire, and everything’s on fire because I’m in hell, but that’s fine.” Watch closely and my face will usually give this away. Not writing was another way to not deal with the scary things in life.  Being alone with my thoughts was the last thing I wanted to do this year, and putting them down in words for strangers on the internet to see was an even more daunting task.

        I’m 30 years old now and I don’t think I have any of the answers I magically should by now. (It’s magic, right? That’s how it works?) I don’t think my childhood self could even comprehend that one day I would actually turn 30, so at least I don’t have those large, whimsical expectations to live up to. But, the things I can control, I do. This year, I checked many, many things off of my “things to do in life” list. I celebrated my 30th birthday with the most ridiculous parties in Las Vegas. I went to Mexico on vacation, I invested in a beautiful piece of artwork, went to the gym a hell of a lot more, met some wonderful new people, and said ‘yes’ to doing so many new things. I’m still navigating life just the same as any of the rest of us, but I’m trying to do so with a little style and strength. This blog is one of the ways I like to do that. And like I always say…

Until next time,

EVA♥