Neo-words

Focus focus discipline.

I can’t I can’t I can’t win.

Lose it, lost it, once again.

Seek it, sought it, find the pin.

Laser, loser, precision.

Dueling needles, under skin.

Dig it, dig it, carve it in.

Kick it, kick it, in the shin.

Focus focus, self-control.

Hocus pocus, rig’marole.

One track mind, my mental goal.

No fault for a lack of soul.

Darling, darling, darling dear.

Keep me, keep me, keep me near.

Show me the darkness you fear.

Take me with, don’t leave me here.

Call me gorgeous, precious sphere.

Shed a crystalline blue tear.

Underground, bones rotting here.

Living hell, my darling dear. 

Darkness, darkness, in the hole.

Hill of beans upon the fool.

Working with the crudest tool.

Found my mind and lost my cool.  

Habits: Breaking VS. Making

Shining the sink is the FlyLady habit of the month for January.  I've attempted to make this little FlyHabit infiltrate my daily routine before but it didn't take.  I've decided this is the perfect opportunity to try again.  Why?  Because, let's face it, this habit makes sense!  One thing I've learned that helps ward off depression is dragging your sorry ass out of bed to stare a shining sink in the face.  You know what it means??  There are NO fucking dishes to do right off the bat. A sink full of dirty dishes never helps you want to 'come to' in the morning or afternoon or evening, especially when depressed.  Why not look out for your tired, cranky, low mood morning self by setting her up for a better outlook? An ounce of prevention, they say. What it is supposed to symbolize in a FlyLady sense is your self love.  A big smiling face of an EMPTY sink.  That's like a made bed in the morning, it's the start of a not so terrible day.  It's a great symbol of the power of habits. Surely, if that sink could greet me every morning, empty and shining, it would help me accomplish more in a day and ward off the blues?  Surely?!?!  Surely.  If I could ONLY make it a habit, but habits can be almost as hard to make as they are to break.  Habits, good or bad, are also those things that will make you or break you.

It is said that it takes 21 days to make or break a habit. There isn't much validity to this statement; while true for some, it takes everyone's neural pathways a different length of time to form or forget or whatever they do. Also, longstanding habits have carved out deeper pathways than new developing ones. The data can't prove it really takes 21 days, but if you can maintain something that long it's probably safe to say you're on your way to success.

The things that we do repeatedly without effort in our routine are the things that will make us a success or a failure. Brushing your teeth, showering, taking care of yourself, these are all good habits. NOT doing those things is a bad habit, either way, they effect your quality of life. If I am chronically dehydrated because every day I am falling incredibly short of my intake needs plus drinking mostly coffee on top of that just to keep up the illusion that I have enough energy to complete my daily duties, then I am continually failing in other areas in my life and this is most definitely affecting my overall strength, stamina, and determination...crippling any REAL chances of success. A dehydrated brain can work at a rate comparable to one that has lost an entire night of sleep. One daily habit could be a big snowball in the avalanche of factors that cause us to continually fall short. It's incredible how everything effects everything else in some way. Can't think right; can't get right!

Habits are hard to break, no matter what they are. Your brain builds neural pathways when you pick up a habit and the longer you've had it or been indulging in the behavior, the stronger that pathway is. Maybe it's more like a highway. How do you shut down a highway with that much traffic on it? What happens to those vehicles using the highway once you shut it down? It's just closed, but that concrete road is still there. It's still a perfectly good road....and those vehicles are going to try like hell to get back on that highway, because it gets them where they want to go. You need to keep the road closed long enough that the vehicles turn around or get lost!! Odds are that roadway in your brain will always be there, which is why people can stop smoking for years and then be undone by sending one car down that nicotine highway. BAM! Open for traffic!

It's perhaps a little easier to start construction on a new highway, but still is quite the daunting task. I've been consumed with habits. I've been perpetually obsessed with perfecting my daily routine, because therein lays your success or failure. But I guess if succeeding was easy, everyone would be doing it. It's hard for all of us.

I need to shine the sink, so that it can be a daily reminder of my determination and love for myself. I need to make it a habit. I need to make drinking adequate water a habit, so that it comes naturally, because that is the first step in giving my body the sustenance and love that it desperately needs.

What good habits do you have? What are your bad ones?

Ode to [My] Sense of Humor

What saved me in life?
It was you, it was you.
Just by doing,
What you do, what you do.
Pointing out ludicrous found comedy,
Teaching my eyes just what to see. 

Cracking a joke,
For a laugh, for a laugh.
Teasing was always,
Your craft, was your craft.
Punchlines and smiles, sublime divinations,
Joshing and giggles, more motivation.

Humor was what
Got me through, got me through.
Laughing was all
I could do, I could do.
It's better than viewing a pure tragedy.
It's better than sex....allegedly. 

Do You Trust Your Brakes?

I was cleaning old text messages off of my phone this evening and I came to a thread between my sister and I when she was home from Korea in July.  I read through it before deleting it and was reminded of a silly scenario that we made into a metaphor one night when we popped into a friend's barn for an impromptu visit on the way to Weis market.  I almost forgot about it, accept she mentioned it in one of her last messages to me before she boarded her plane to return to Korea.  She asked me, "Do you trust your brakes?"

We were standing around bullshitting about this and that and then as the guys began to talk politics our right brain geared minds grew bored and started playing with thoughts and objects laying about. Luckily there were some matchbox cars sitting on something nearby.  My sister immediately started to drive them around and make noises.  It is this childlike side of her presence that I miss the most, the one that makes me laugh and jokes me out of sadness.  I miss that side of her that gets that side of me going until we are suddenly playing with matchbox cars like children while adults discuss the government around us.  Oblivious.  We've honed our skill well; my sister and I can block out the world with our childhood coping mechanisms anytime.  This isn't always the most polite of things to do and I am sure we can seem rude, but we sometimes have little control over where the moment takes us. 

This moment took us to high speeds in a pretend car, jumping over ramps and heading straight for a wall.  One of us did the fake squeaky brake noise as the car stopped suddenly.  I remember posing the question, "Yes, but do you trust your brakes?"  Heading at a wall at high speeds how can you be sure that your brakes are indeed going to work when the moment comes?  How do you know that they will stop you?  You need to have a certain amount of faith in your brakes, to trust them in a huge sense.  But should you have to trust them so much when so many variables are influenced by you?  Speed, for one, is always a factor and it can be controlled.

If you head straight into anything  balls to the wall, you risk coming to a sudden lethal stop if you don't control your speed or use your brakes.  Most of the time though, people take for granted that their brakes are there.  They take off out of the gate pedal to the floor, burnin' tire, hootin' and a hollerin', speeding into the world...and trust that this system will later be in place to stop them before they get into any danger.  On a dime, even.  This isn't always the case, though, is it?  Should we be so bold as to let the future of our lives up to a precaution we don't have COMPLETE control over? Some people underestimate their speed and forget that they are in control of the brakes.  They are essentially only a steering passenger, but their judgement is needed, they are still commanding the vehicle.  The timing is their decision...their choice.  Whenever and however your vehicle comes to a stop is [in most cases and figuratively] up to you.  You are the matchbox car.  You control the brakes. 

So, do you trust your brakes?  Do you trust that you will stop when the time comes, when it matters most?  When you want to?  When you need to?  Or will you hit that wall?  There's a chance that you could even survive hitting a wall, there's a smaller chance you could crash right on through it.  Your brakes may be immaculate and you may have steel strong willpower.  So then, if you trust your brakes, do you trust yourself to use them?  Now, that...is a metaphor.

Writer's Block and Compelling Tells

I have been meaning to finish up so many writing 'projects' for the longest time but I just haven't been feeling it.  Scrawled words emerge from time to time on random substrates, but I have been distanced from my writer's mind for some time.  Well, not the mind, just the motion.  Lines pop into my head as usual, but I don't grab a pen.  I let them fall to the bottom of my mind, and figure if the words were that good...they would come back to me.  Some do, some don't. That's the funny thing about words.

I like to have my trusty Moleskine with me, and it is usually in my purse, but I've been using it only for concert noting on the go, as of late.  I've been lost in thought instead of words.  The truth is I have dozens of journals and notebooks...aching for words.  Blank pages scream at me from every corner of my space, but I have not felt compelled to touch them.  I've been lost in instruments more so, but have been lax with that as well, until last week when I was compelled to pick up my Alvarez for three days straight.  Being compelled is another funny thing.  It's almost like a program in your brain you have to follow; you are driven to carry out the mission.  I just didn't seem to want to do anything else, so I just went with it...and let the housework back up.  My bathroom paid, but I was rewarded.  It lasted three straight days and then waned.  It felt good.  Sometimes, I am just compelled to do things and it feels best to just go with it.

So, today while I was in the store for a few things, I was compelled to buy a notebook and pens.  Stationery.  It should be known that I have a thing for stationery; I'm drawn to it like a moth to a flame.  I wander away from my husband at the site of the paper aisle in a store.  I am ridiculous in Staples.  It's borderline fetish.  Okay, I don't feverishly rub composition books on my genitals, or anything, (although if it was a leather bound journal, now...) there is just nothing like a fresh tablet and brand new pens! So, even though I know I have plenty of notebooks of every size and color, I for some reason felt I needed to purchase a small 3 subject Mead notebook and a pack of pens that claimed they were 'The smoothest in the world!'  The Bic Velocity. Good pen.  Smooth.

I felt compelled and went with it and got the tablet and pens.  If my Self says she wants a tablet on a whim, then what does that say?  What deeper tells does my spirit show?  Perhaps that she is ready to write again.  Perhaps that she wants new paper...for her new words.  Or...perhaps she is just a fetishist after all.  Let's see what she is compelled to do with it.

If the Shirt Fits: Who is Missie Sue?

As is the norm for the daily and weekly monotonous grind of my life, it seems anymore, I am once again "dejunking".  What does that even mean?  There is too.much.stuff!!  The trouble is, my house really isn't sized for hoarding, and I haven't quite learned to let go yet.  Cut me some slack; I don't even have an attic or a basement!  (And it is far better that way...I think.  I still pine!)  But, I desperately want to simplify!  I'm practicing.  I have started to go into a brave "pitch it" phase that I very much want to take full advantage of in multiple areas of our home.  Lucky for me, my husband was relatively baggage free when we met, he had few physical possessions and not many noticeable issues.  "Score!  'Cause we're gonna need enough room for all of my shit!!"  (That's a metaphor!)  I have been carrying some of my baggage with me since before grade school!  It's pretty hard to part with something you have had that long, whether you use it daily or not.  We shared a space for nearing twenty years!  These things have surely absorbed my energies, and I have, I'm sure, sucked up some of their essences.  What defines you?  The stuff that touches you?  The things you keep?  The things you let go of?  If I cast off the things I used once to define myself, will I be any less myself?
 
I don't really believe we are defined by our possessions, I uphold, rather, the near opposite belief, I can be very anti physical reality at times. I am, as I say, obsessively nostalgic. Go figure!  I do think I compulsively hold on to certain items for a reason.  I also struggle daily with getting the junk out in some sort of a routine!  I have so far THIS TIME AROUND been able to go through the spices and some of the vitamins and medicines. I tossed a lot of expired and old things.  No matter how small the object, this act is terrifying and empowering.  I feel a tiny bit of control in the out of control nature of pitching and tossing.  I have a bag full at the door of clothes.  I have a bag I am currently filling up.  I tossed in some things I pulled out of the glove and winter hat stash.  I am going through sweaters and already have three that can definitely go.  I'm trying to see these things differently.  Perhaps...it will be easier to let go if they aren't so useful? (They aren't.)  If they aren't so comforting?  (They stress me out!)  If they no longer have a purpose and I realize how I don't really use them or need them anyway it will be easier to toss the shit out!  (Yes!)  If you don't love it, it isn't useful, and it doesn't save you time or make you money....hey hey hey...goodbye!!

My big red fuzzy bathrobe, for instance.  I got it from a friend, it's awesome and warm.  To me, it's a tastefully dyed Egyptian cotton.  In reality, it is bright red and 100% polyester.  It's a Secret Treasure.  It's an impostor; a used bathrobe.  It's not even my very own, knitted out of fetal goat hair gathered on the full moon and dyed with my own menstrual blood or anything.  What's the attachment?  I can't help but wonder why I have kept it for so long when it isn't a real part of my life and honestly, I don't even use a bathrobe...but I fancy that I might.  It is for this reason I have so many clothes, so many books, so many art supplies, so many containers, so many totes full of things, things I fancy as essential parts of my life.  Things that I fancy a use for someday.  Things that I fancy will fit me one day.  I fancy I might, when it suites my fancy.  Well, isn't that grand?  The grand clutter of Missie Sue.  Who is she, in all this mess?

I have this plaid, short sleeved, button down shirt.  I believe it was one I took from my father's closet in high school, when I was very into wearing my dad's old shirts from the 70's and 80's.  I was also into punk at the time, which seemed to be into name tags.  Silly ones, real ones, whatever, it was a style.  I wanted a name tag, but not a fake one.  I didn't want something made for someone else; I wanted something completely original, my own name.  It was at this time that I decided to combine my nickname and my middle name and make it greater than the sum of its parts.  I cut a small piece of an iron on patch and by my sloppy hand embroidered it with the name "Missie Sue" in yellow cross stitch thread.  Missie Sue became a character that represented my dominant side, the part of me that was desperately seeking an identity in high school.  That part inside that was going to express itself or die.  The same side that writes this blog, the same Missie Sue.  This shirt fits me like a glove.  It was my very first uniform, my first super hero cape.  My name tag.  I bravely named myself, creating my own brand in an attempt to avoid receiving a label.  Unfortunately, I still received plenty of those, but fortunately I  established a relationship with my "better" side, a relationship that continues today, the longest relationship I will ever be in.

So, do I really need a red bathrobe for comfort?   Would I miss it if it wasn't here to occasionally throw on for warmth?  Should a person struggling with depression really purposely make it a habit to wear a bathrobe MORE often?  Isn't that just insult to injury?  Should I toss the plaid shirt?  It would look good over a blue or brown tank top?  I could probably pull off plaid with a fedora?  I could rock it out for old time's sake.  Will I actually WEAR my old uniform ever again?  Is it REALLY a necessary part of my wardrobe or person, required to be who I am?  Probably not...but I fancy it is.

What's the attachment?

Me To You,
Missie Sue

Fetal Hoarder Syndrome: Know the Signs

You know how I know I am a fetal hoarder?  While dejunking my bathroom I found, of course, some junk, including a few odd items that I had stashed on the shelves above the washer and dryer.
This is normal, most people have junk. Is it normal to save your cleansing bottle from your hospital stay 2 years ago when you birthed your first child? It's a perfectly good bottle! Could be used to hold some fluid? To squirt onto a wild fire, perhaps, or some outbreak of the plague in your nether region? I certainly wouldn't be letting anyone borrow said bottle, so what were my intentions? I have no idea. No idea.
THANKFULLY I also found those two pieces to the glider chair that we burned earlier this year! Awesome. You never know what those miscellaneous pieces of wood could be used for. They're already varnished, even! Ch!
The Downy Ball is important, right? You need that fabric soft and if you don't have a reservoir in your washer you are shit not of luck. I needed this Downy Ball when I was in college. The washer in the house I lived in needed it....over ten years ago! I have never required the use of this item since then, but you just never know when I could be suddenly surprised at the door by someone needing to borrow one, or if I wake up one day and my washer is different. It pays to be prepared... sometimes.
Samples of shit are great for when you run out of shampoo or lotion! What makes them even better is time. These random ones I found hale from the college era, just like the Downy Ball. Because what I want when I am completely out of conditioner, which never seems to happen, is a shot of goo that has lost all of its color, scent, and possibly potency as well.
Outdated emulsion is always handy, too, and by that I mean when the hell would I ever use this? You never know when I would feel like doing some screens just for fun that wouldn't turn out or expose at all.
An empty bottle of men's shampoo? Why not. The tiny remnants in the bottom of the bottle are more than enough to offer to the random men that show up wanting to wash their hair that I just don't want to disappoint. Why? No, I mean why did this end up here?
No collection of junk is complete without an unopened, stashed pack of travel tissues that you have had intact for no less than 4 years. What better place for them to remain than right next to the remote control to a DVR box we have never used. (Remember, I found these things in the bathroom.)
All of this stuff is useful and has value, you haters probably don't even know what a perfectly good cardboard box is worth either, just like my husband. It's sad, really.
Yes, Missie, very sad indeed.

Chair pieces, empties, and questionables.

My Desk Is Lava

There is the theory that all outer chaos mirrors inner chaos, or visa versa. It's an idea, a thought, a hard truth? I'm a believer. I'm constantly struggling to fit all of my stuff into my space. I have been working on cleaning out some dark recesses again this week. I am aware that I have some hoarder tendencies, and possibly too many possessions for our humble home.  I'm not a crazy materialist, we just all need stuff and I've been collecting it my entire life!  Also, I have a home business and about a million hobbies. Plus, I lost my office when we decided to breed, so the dining room is where the remnants settled.
My Desk is certainly a hot spot, to say the very least. It's sometimes a volcano spewing lava. I have the OCD to create an excellent system, I simply also have the ADD to not follow through with said system. I'll reinvent, follow, tire, fail and repeat! THAT'S MY ROUTINE! I feel like I finally manage to get on this bucking bull, only to lose my grasp again. Flung to the ground. That's a metaphor. My inability to schedule and organize myself stems from something far greater than laziness.
This is my Desk, which is basically a glorified shelf, or a waste basket filing system? It has better days than others. There is some order in this chaos, though, you better believe it...I'm just not sure where I put it right now.
So, is my inner chaos mirroring my surroundings? Or is my outer chaos a reflection of my confused inner realm? I'm not sure, but if they can meet in the middle, maybe I can ride that bull a little longer this time! Either ride the bull or live with the lava!

-MS

7 Thoughts by The Good and Bad Voices

Why I Feel Bad For My Daughter

                                                                                 

1. She got the short end of the stick.
2. She is only a toddler and is aware of my fluctuating moods.
3. She sees things in her mama she shouldn’t see. 
4. She is my blood relation.
5. She has a high chance of turning out just like me. 
6. She has a highly depressive, artsy, flake of a mother.
7. I’m selfish.

Why I Feel Good For My Daughter

1. She got a piece of the stick!!
2. She is only a toddler and is empathetic enough to understand when I am down.
3. She sees the good in me when I can only see the bad.
4. She is my blood relation.
5. She has a high chance of turning out just like me, only stronger. 
6. She will understand how complicated people can be before I send her off into it.
7. She is learning independence. 

This has been a random pointless list brought to you by Self-Loathing and Positive Thinking.  

My Sin in Song

My sin in song,

I want it all.

Inside I hide all of the pieces,

That fell down to scatter the ground

The day that I broke you.

I surround them like a foaming bitch,

Defending her bloody pups.

Loyally feral, by your side.

Fighting off my sullen pride.

The cracks are mine,

The sin is sacred.

I’ll find the glue.

I’ll do the mending.

My sin in song,

I have it all.

Inside I find all of the pieces,

That fit together and need each other,

To make up our twisted picture.

I archive it like a needy bitch,

Saving all of her fuck ups,

Royally clinging, to her insides.

Choking back her futile cries.

The cracks are mine,

The sin is sacred.

I’ll find the glue.

I’ll do the mending.

I’ll fix it I’ll fix it, I’ll show you.

I’ll do it, I’ll do it, I’ll know you.

My sin is song,

I make it all.

Outside I hold all of the pieces.

That come together with perspective,

And harmonize with loving truces.

I am the monster, I am the bitch,

Dropping all of the pieces. 

Sinfully grabbing, onto low tides.

Stepping aside, shedding skin of lies.

The cracks are mine,

The sin is sacred.

I’ll find the glue.

I’ll do the mending.

The scars are me,

The skin is marked.

I’ll be the light.

I’ll be the dark.

2/22/12

I sit with your specter and converse...

I sit with your specter and converse,

As if he was beside me throughout my day.

I work on the dishes and go off about loyalty and freedom.

I rest in the living room on the chaise lounge with strawberries,

I express with faux feelings to faux fellows in faux words. 

“She breaks just like a little girl,” I tell him.

He listens silently.

No reply.

He absorbs all that I am.

He watches me scrub the toilet.  I laugh and tell him about duty.

He sees my melt downs, he sees my build ups.

He witnesses my crazy core yet still he stays with lended ear. 

He has no choice. 

My mind holds him tightly in focus.

The edges blur but I won’t avert my eyes. 

4/5/12

November Blog #24: "Alone vs. A Loner"

NaBloPoMo Prompt of the Day (Nov 24): Do you enjoy being alone? Would you rather be around other people?

I think that I probably answered this question when I blogged about my secret pleasure.  In retrospect, I guess it really wasn’t much of a secret.  It’s pretty obvious to me, and to some, but I suppose to others it wouldn’t be.  Maybe that is why I chose it.  Would I rather be alone or around people?  I always described myself as an introverted extrovert.  This may be a silly contradictory phrase, but it really does make perfect sense for me.  Vice versa would hold true, as well; I am also an extroverted introvert. 

www.righteousmonster.com

I grew up in a decent sized family.  There were six of us all together.  I had 3 siblings, two younger sisters and an older brother.  Not big by older standards by any means, but 4 children is quite a bit for today.  I was the second child, but the oldest daughter.  Sometimes it felt as though I was the oldest in general.  It goes without saying that the first born is born into a deal of responsibility in the hierarchy of a family, and being the first of three girls and so close to my brother in age, I was no different. 

Although being in a big family forced me to interact with people throughout most of my days, I also preferred to spend a lot of time in my room and/or alone as a child.  I didn’t dislike my family, per se; all families have issues.  As I mentioned in my blog about my secret pleasure, I am not sure if I am just innately like this or I became this way because of conditions during my development.  It’s just simply how I am. 

I actually prefer to be with people; I love social interaction, I love conversing.  I just need almost as much time alone.  That is to say, I am accustomed to getting as much time alone.  My husband’s work takes him away all week, so up until I had the baby, it was just me and the dog during the weeks here.  I lived the half life of a bachelorette.  I must say, having the baby has saved me from loneliness more than I ever could have imagined.  She’s like my new best friend.  I prefer to be with her, honestly.  As a Stay-at-Home, I have also become accustomed to having her with me 24/7. 

As she keeps growing and we bond more and more every day, I find myself changing more and more.   My “self” is changing to include her as well.  I’m “alone” with Celie a lot of the time, but I am not really alone.  Sure, she isn’t an adult capable of intellectual debate and stimulating conversation, but she fulfills my social needs in a way I could never have comprehended before.  Don’t get me wrong, I still need time away from her, I still need time completely alone, and I still need time to be social without her, but I am growing more and more each day.  I believe I am being re-socialized by my daughter; she is making me co-dependent.  This is something I have kind of had a battle against since my husband and I got together.  I had to detach myself in a way from the loneliness I felt every time he left me or I would never be able to live the life that we do.  Even though I still feel this loneliness every day he is gone, my daughter is helping me to not feel so alone and feel more okay with him leaving me so much. 

Overall, I am a homebody.  I enjoy spending quality personal time with my family and that is what I choose to do most times.  I also would never be what I am today without the social stimulation of my friends.  I have learned things in solitude that one can never learn in social circles.  I have, in turn, learned many things in a social circle that one can never learn in solitude.  Although I have come far and overcome many personal obstacles, I continue to walk the thin line between social butterfly and social outcast. 

November Blog #4: "I'm Not An Addict, Babe...Eeeh....That's a Lie!"

"When you are writing, do you prefer to use a pen or a computer?"

While the computer is a useful writer’s pal, especially in today’s day and age, there is nothing quite like pen on paper.  Like its predecessor the typewriter, the computer is the most practical way to do mass writing for web logs, novels, books, papers, etc.  I do most of my blogging/internet writing on the computer, of course, but when it comes to working on poetry or lyrics of any kind, I prefer my journals and tablets and papers, napkins, envelopes, and the like.  Something that allows you to slow down and be a bit more reflective.

If I am attempting to work on a story or something of that nature I usually prefer the computer; when I am inspired for a short burst the keyboard is a much faster means of getting it out right away.  I prefer journals and comfortable flowing pens for prose, poetry, or just random daily notes/musings or one sentence thoughts or reflections.  I have 2 main journals for writing such things in.    

Most of my writing during the majority of my life has actually been of the old fashioned pen and paper variety.   Actually, ever since I have been a pre teen I have had somewhat of an obsession or infatuation…fetish? …with stationary.  Pens…paper.  Journals…tablets…pencils.  I love it.  I probably have a handful of blank notebooks in the house at the moment.  My husband gets on me when we are in the store and I stop to peruse the stationary aisle.  The thing is, I am most times not interested in buying anything in particular.  I just want to browse.  I don’t know what it is.  Maybe how people window shop for clothes or can’t help but stop at the pet store window and look at the puppies?  Maybe I want something to cry out “take me home!” Who knows.  

I can’t help it; I love stationary.  I love fresh new pens, new markers, unsharpened pencils, mechanical pencil packs, Sharpies, highlighters, comfy grip medium pens, tablets, pads, sheets of paper, binders. I love journals, lovely journals covered in faux leather or canvas with the slim little silk of a book mark hanging daintily over her back!  Oh, the thinks you could write in all of those nice fresh lovely journals!  And look at that pack of new pens.  ….  What?  No.  I’m fine. 

My husband says I am a border-line hoarder, not only because of my stationary “problem”, but for my obsession with tubbies and totes, my desire to save “perfectly good boxes”, and my collecting of silver-backed wrappers for projects.  I have also, to his dismay, saved most of the baby food jars we have bought with the baby for a future project!  I’m not a hoarder, damn it!  Okay.  Alright, I can SEE where you might think it is a little bit of a problem, but trust me.  TRUST me.  I have it all under control!  I have plans.  I’m going to use all of this!  And what’s up with the boxes?? You just don’t know how to appreciate a PERFECTLY good cardboard box, man!  I mean, that thing is practically new, do you not understand the possibilities?  

Seriously, though, he knows I’m not a real hoarder, but I do have my “things” and he certainly knows them.  He does assist me in putting back all of my jars and tubbies into the nooks and crannies we have to offer for space in the shed , so my argument must be convincing enough anyway and I appreciate and love him for it.  ...But I can’t help it.  First of all, tubbies are just practical!  I mean, they hold stuff!   But, I do love stationary.  I have a pack of pens at least on deck usually, or always seem to buy packs to replace the ones I keep at my desk because they migrate.  I’m not sure where they go, I don’t know if they are like a faithful dog who wanders off into the woods to die when he’s gettin’ low?  If people take them accidentally with them?  I mean, I know I have about 30 of them right now in my purse probably, but still.  I keep buying them.  You would think I would end up with a lot more pen carcasses laying around here for the full packs I seem to buy?  I'm just a gatherer!  It's in my nature. My brain just knows that they're valuable!  It's like a bird making a nest!  "And now we add the pens!"   I want to stock pens!  I’m not sure where all the pens go, though...  ? It's a mystery. 

Anyway.  Yes.  Pen to paper.  I prefer pen to paper for “relaxed and reflective” writing.  I prefer computer for ranting because my fingers can do a better job at keeping up with my wandering mind on the keys than with a pen.  Although, if you saw my chicken scratch cursive scrawling, you’d probably think it was a close race.   

I personally like the Bic Atlantis.  It has been my pen of choice as of late.  I don’t like the fancy ball point type pens.  They’re nice and all but most run very easily if something is spilled on them.  It’s funny how people have favorite pens, but it is really just a tool, isn’t it?  To a writer, the pen is a tool just as the brush, the hammer, the chisel, the ax, the scalpel, the saw, or the knife.  Crafts(wo)men take pride in their tools.    

[ Got yourself a favorite pen? ]