Beauty of the Backroads

Lessons in unexpected places.

The Middle

/ Jess / 21 Comments

Where to start writing after a six plus month period of not writing. Tricky. The beginning sounds sort of reasonable maybe, but some ‘begin to now’ timeline feels a bit more linear today than I’d like. My last post was a self invented challenge of sorts to not post any photographs and simply write, words. To essentially get back to the roots of why I started this blog in the first place.

From May to now, I have a whopping zero posts done. None. I suppose I could chalk it up to all the normal stuff that comes into play: busy with other things, life, this and that, the days tic by and before I knew it, half a year had passed. Those certainly are a huge chunk of it. But, also intertwined in the mix was a combo of blocks. Maybe you know them? Writer’s Block, Artist Block, Creativity Block. Seems like they can sneak in when we are preoccupied with various things and they can make themselves right at home. Soon, staring at a blank screen or blank notebook can lose its appeal and become an avenue of “I should write/ draw/ create, but I can’t. Nothing is coming out.”

Which, really, is not the coolest thing ever. It’s like sitting on the edge of some grand-to-me idea but not being able to pinpoint what exactly it is. Last spring that is where I was. I had a feeling I was meant to be doing some ‘thing’, but couldn’t figure it out what it was.

Until I did. An amazing tool showed up. Enter the book called, “The Artist’s Way.” I love that, don’t you? How tools show up? Especially those times when they really, truly resonate. As I did the tasks, the blocks started becoming clear. Where they came from, how they got there, why they stuck. Things I had totally forgotten about such as: comments made to me in my youth, getting yelled at by the art teacher in sixth grade in front of everyone, competitiveness carried over from many years, and more. As I continued to do the work, more things unraveled.

What a gift it is to let all that stuff go, even now. To open up and let my authentic in like I have never been able to do before. It’s been a somewhat hard, but beautiful adventure. I saw old patterns and even figured out why I’ve never had the confidence to stand up for myself or on my own. Enlightening, to say the least. Anyway, tonight I had a draw to the blog, to write some post about whatever came to mind. This is it, ha ha. It feels really nice to sit down and write something again. So instead of starting at point A and going to Z, I believe I’ll keep writing from right where I am, in the middle.

Simply Words

/ Jess / 23 Comments

This poor blog, forever faithful, just waiting for me to write something. Anything. Seven months have pasted since my last post, which seems quite unreal. We all know how quickly the months parade on by, without even blinking, but, dang time can slow down already.

Here it is, almost summertime. My peonies are bursting with petals and color. All our trees are long past blooms and are wearing their lovely greens. This week has been crazy with storms. Two days in a row it got very dark and the wind unleashed itself and whipped about. Lots of damage in areas around us, but we were spared.

I’ve tried to blog recently using my phone. I’d like to think that I am pretty technology savvy.  I mean, for eleven months last year, I was taking a super hard computer IT class. It was amazingly difficult and I did pretty well. I learned about figuring out what’s wrong with a computer, the Linux operating system, Windows, administrative tools, working on the command line, how networking works, internet security and more.

So, here is the funny thing. I used to blog from my phone, which is essentially a computer of sorts. I could upload my pictures to my blog page right from my phone. Easy. Convenient. Loved it. But, now, I can’t. Enter two words: parental controls.

My gosh, that makes me laugh. There is some setting on my phone that won’t allow me to share my photos with WordPress. No luck. I have googled it. I have tried resetting the settings. Nothin’.

What’s a girl to do? A girl that is born to write?

I decided that maybe this is a test of sorts. Honestly, I started this blog to write and as it progressed, I got rather distracted by photograph sharing instead. Which is fabulous, I LOVE taking pictures, it’s one of the best things I know how to do. But, I notice looking back at old posts, there’s lots of pictures and little words.

I’m going to challenge myself to get creative with words again. To get my keyboard clicking and letters to appear on the screen. If any of you are still here, I guess we will see where this leads. It used to be when I would publish a post, the sweet folks on my email list would be notified. Not sure if that still happens when a blog has become quite stagnant for months on end. Guess we will see.

Maybe I will eventually figure out how to upload my pictures here. I’d really love for you to see my flowers and my chickens, who are new. We got three hens a few days ago and I love them! Kittens are next on the list of things we’d like to have. So, hopefully, pictures will show up here again. For now, though, it’s simply words.

I Thank You

/ Jess / 43 Comments

They say time flies by, but I’ve noticed it’s more like a track meet at the long jump competition where they dash to the line and jump an enormous amount of feet in the air.

While some days it feels like time is a perpetual turning on clock hands that never stop, sometimes time flows as swiftly as a river’s current on its way to other places.

Today when I opened up my notifications, this picture greeted me! Four years of blogging! FOUR YEARS!! What? Who? When? Where did four years go?

I thought about where I was four years ago today. Back then, a few days before, I had been released from a week long unexpected hospital stay and was sent home thinking I had the possibility of having something pretty catastrophic wrong with me.

In the wee hours of this anniversary night four years ago, I hid in my closet and somehow figured out how to set up a blog! I was one of those “I’m never going to blog” girls, but sickness and the thought I might not have much time to spare, shifted things very quickly.

I had no idea how to blog, so I bought “WordPress For Dummies” and I figured it out step by step. Pure determination.

So, today I’m going to celebrate the fact that they were wrong about me, that I’m still here, and that I’m so grateful for this blog. I’ve made a lot of friends by blogging and it’s been amazing adventure of creativity and self expression in my writing and photography. To be able to share things with the world is such a gift.

Whatever your part in my journey has been, I thank you. ❤️

Let’s Wear Kindness Well

/ Jess / 23 Comments

Yesterday a fellow blogger, Phoebe, had a post inviting people to share words of encouragement that they use to cheer/lift someone up. I thought that was the most fabulous idea!

Reading the comments was endearing and refreshing. I mean, most days the world is made out to be such a cold and not nice place, you know?

But, here were all these thoughts, eloquently strung together to make anyone feel a little bit better. And, in that sense, it reminds me of nature. Nature brings such a comfort, especially flowers. No wonder flower shops are so busy.

So, today, I thought I’d do sort of a spin off of Phoebe’s idea. In the comments, please feel free to share any and all words of encouragement, praise, comfort, etc to anybody out there that may need it.

I’ll go first:

To whoever needs this today,

You are the sun, you know? Even with all the ‘buts, ands, and howevers’ you are worthy of wonderful things. ❤️

So, please join me! Feel free to offer up your words of grace. Let’s be like the flowers, let’s wear kindness well.