fever pitch

When I began a social media fast nearly ten days ago, I honestly thought I'd spend time writing and writing and writing. That's not what happened though.

I did rediscover my habit of writing in my journal—with pen and actual paper. I'd accidentally let it go in the move when the journal got packed and I couldn't find it for like eight months. I guess I could have/should have started a new journal, but I didn't. It's been nice to reflect each evening on the day's events without any thought of what other people think except for whenever I die. That'll be fun. Or maybe it'll all end up in the garbage. Who even knows.

So anyway. I wrote in my journal. I thought about writing stuff. I even began a quick jotting down of the beginning of a romance novel I am considering writing, but there certainly could have been more time and effort put into that quick jotting down.

Oh, and I played a ton of crossword puzzle games with people. I decided that wasn't part of anything potentially wounding my soul, so I had some fun there. I was reminded how much I love words and word games. So very fun! But I digress.

You know what I really thought would happen? That I'd burn through the completion of my dad's book I'm writing due to be published in DECEMBER. Let's just not talk about how I did absolutely zero of that. Zero. I feel like panicking now even though that's not anything I was planning on discussing.

What I did do is get comfortable with quiet. I sat and thought about things I want to do. I missed sharing some of my thoughts about things I did and accomplished, but overall, the peace and quiet soaked right into my soul. I cancelled plans that ended up not mixing well with my quiet routine. I made fresh plans and did things that felt perfectly aligned with this quietness. I connected with friends and family in additional ways. Spending time thinking about and praying for my family helped me to connect.

I want to recognize that I am always reaching out to others and trying to be a genuine friend and loving family member. This social media fast just rerouted some of my pathways to continue being my caring self. And I loved it.

One of the most wonderful surprises from my social media fast is how I've enjoyed making time for family history work. I've chipped away at it here and there in the past, but this quietness opened up more room for me to get excited about it, to feel for my ancestors, and want to get to know them by connecting them on our family tree.

The intensity of it threw me off actually. I caught myself weeping when I'd see a baby's burial record. I cried allowed with deep sorrow when I first saw the record of one of my ancestors who had gotten divorced. The other divorce records I discovered were hard to bear too, but that first discovery hit me like a ton of bricks. I felt the sorrow within me as if I truly knew each of them. Much of my emotion can be chalked up to putting myself in their shoes and projecting my own experiences with life, but I cannot ignore how very connected I have become with many of the people I've discovered. I took time to read obituaries and birth and death records and various "memories" attached to records by very distant cousins and such.

At this point, I hardly want to slow this fever pitch created by quiet, loving work. Alas, I cannot clear my schedule of all else every single day forever; I do need to keep a job and take care of my children, who are part of this peace I've found. I intend to find ways to make space for this intense quiet. Because of it, I've found my new favorite hobby—loving my family.