Some weeks are just hard.
This week I am pulled in several different directions for volunteer projects I’m involved with. All beautiful, wonderful things, but things that require a lot of busy work and last minute fire extinguishing.
It’s the anniversary week of my dad’s death followed seven days later by his birthday. Never a fun week as the grief that’s always there makes itself uniquely present.
A dear friend’s mother passed unexpectedly and I so desperately want to just sit next to her and hold her hand for days on end (see above).
The western part of my beloved North Carolina has been devastated by Hurricane Helene and it’s heartbreaking to watch while we’re finding ways to help from afar.
And of course there are the regular demands on our daily life that don’t just evaporate when the rest of the world gets hard.
It’s just a lot.
And so I don’t have writing tips or mindset advice or inspirational quotes this week.
I only have this: sometimes it’s hard.
Sometimes you have to put the writing down.
Sometimes you have to grieve or scream or nap or do other things.
Sometimes the rest of the world is more important.
And that’s okay.
Let’s all take a deep breath together and get through this morning.
This afternoon will be different.
Or it won’t.
Either way, we will rest tonight and start tomorrow with another deep breath.
We’ll get through the morning. And then the afternoon.
And if the words come, they come.
And if they don’t, they don’t.
And if we can’t even conceive of being in a place where words are even a possibility, we go somewhere else–for a walk, to talk to a friend, to read a book, to stare at a tree–and we remind ourselves it’s hard.
But it’s not forever.
This week is hard.
Hugs to you.
Monica
PS – If you want to help in NC, you can donate to the North Carolina Disaster Relief Fund, visit nc.gov/donate.
Our family is also supporting Operation Air Drop, a vital resource in this recovery and relief effort due to the difficulty reaching affected areas after mountain roads were simply washed away. You can find info here on ways to help them.
PS 2 – I wrote this earlier in the week and in the last few days, not much has changed. I write these kinds of posts for you when you find yourself in similar situations, but I also write them for me. I’m usually the one who needs to hear it the most. For example, I showed up at my husband’s home office door a hot mess of guilt and shame yesterday afternoon for not being able to push through and be productive and he looked at me and said, “Did you read your own newsletter this week?”
Touché.
Be kind to yourselves when these moments/days/weeks/months of hard pop up. It’s easy to talk the talk (my writing of the post earlier in the week) but not always easy to walk the walk (hence this addendum to let you know that I struggle, too, even when I think I’ve got my you-know-what together).
Adding hugs to the previous ones because I think we can’t get enough of those this week, or really ever. – M