200 Days of Writing

Writing has always been the thing for me. Or at least I like to say it has, but really, it started somewhere through my 8th-grade year. And despite my contention for Mrs. Rindler, it really probably was her daily writing prompts that led me to the dreams I hold most dear.

Each morning in Language Arts, Mrs. Rindler wrote out a writing prompt for us to write to in silence for 5-15 minutes, depending on how exhausted she was from the previous class. Afterwards, we were told to share with our desk-mates and sometimes, if I was lucky we could share with the whole class.

At that time in my life, I craved attention, lusted after anyone noticing that I wasn’t okay. I carved it into my skin, I was so desperate for someone to see the pain and sadness that, to me, felt like it was dripping from my skin. As unhealthy as this desire for attention was, it was it and Mrs. Rindler’s prompts that led me to writing. And ever since then, it has been my everything.

In college, I studied creative writing. But after years of being stuck in fight or flight, I was blank to the world. I noticed nothing, and nothing noticed me. The only time I felt anything was when I was writing, but I could also see that I did not have the skills nor the conviction to create the skill needed. So I shut down more.

But something always brought me back. Every time I thought about moving down a different path, baker, librarian, teacher, I always end up sick to my stomacha nd turning back to writing. Recently, when I was speaking with a coworker I have known for nearly 8 months, I mentioned writing, and they said, “Oh, you write?”

It really was a simple question, but I realized in that moment that when people thought of me, they didn’t think of writer. Instead, I was the bread baker, the sewist, the cryer, the flighty, the librarian, the sad one, but never the writer. And it seemed about time I did something about that. Because for the past 15 years, it has always come back to this, always come back to writing.

Right now, it is writing; that draw, that dream, that purpose, and I want it to be writing. So I am starting a writing challenge on February 1st.

200 days of writing.

But not just writing. Sharing

Sharing my writing here. I’ve always known that my relationship with writing is dependent on sharing that writing. Since 8th grade in Mrs. Rindler's classroom to college coffee shop open mic nights to every attempt I have made to put my writing out there, WordPress, TikTok, Substack.

Here I am again.

Sharing it. Asking you to read it. Hoping you feel something, you see the pieces of me in it. Hoping you see those pieces of you in it.

So join me in my 200 days.

I’d like to thank the wonderful Andy J. Pizza for his inspiration with the creative pep talk podcast and his own journey with daily creation. And to all my friends whom I won’t be able to tell about this project for fear of blowing out my own steam. I hope I’ll feel comfortable sharing it with you soon.

Still sick wtf

102.5 all day staved off by chasing DayQuil.

My femurs hurt. My eyes feel like they are going to pop out of my head. And all the liquid in my body is being wrung out through my nose.

I’m not going to be able to post or write more than this today. I have come down with a cold or something again.

The first time I entered my parents' house after my dad died, I didn’t feel it. There was only the mess of emergency medical equipment, the stale, old, cluttered scent it always had, and my pain. 

The second time I entered my parents' house, it was full of _____. There isn’t a word for it. That feeling when a room is full of the feeling that something is missing.  It sat somewhere between anticipating his presence and steeling yourself for his absence. Where you know the image is incomplete, and you also know that there isn’t a way to finish it without a person. Some people might call that feeling nothingness, but for me, it feels bigger than that, more complex.

My first desire when I was in the room he died in was to move everything. Throw out the entire hoard he had encased himself in and move the furniture. I wanted to make the space a new one so that my mind wouldn’t be able to place him in it anymore. I didn’t want to pass through the doorway and have my eyes swing over to his empty chair. I didn’t want to face the after-image burned into my eyes of him there, in that spot. And I knew my mother would be feeling the same. 

A year later, the house looks much different. Still full of too many things. Still covered in marks of him, but changed. Changed just enough that you don’t hear him in the kitchen making himself a bowl of cereal. You don’t see him stretch out in his La-Z-Boy reading book after book, Mash chiming from the television. It doesn’t feel like a different home, but our eyes don't insert him where he isn’t anymore. They’ve adjusted.

That feeling of missing him is still there. That void of his absence, felt every time my mother walks through the door to darkness and quiet. It’s still there when I think of Lord of the Rings or when my washer isn’t working right. It’s there when my sister isn’t sure how her insurance works or when my brother moves into his first full-time job. That feeling of missing him isn’t gone. But the rooms are no longer full of _____, and that is something. 

Photo by Lukas Kaufmann on Unsplash

Hey, thanks for coming to day 57 of 200 days of writing.

I definitely wasn't planning to write anything about grief today. But as I was doomscrolling online, I saw a video from a creator named Jonny Thomson a.k.a. - philosophyminis, talking about Sartre and his idea of absence and missing someone. I have not read anything by Sartre, but this is the second time a very influential video about one of Sartre's writings has come across my path and led me to some very deep inner work. I think I will be picking up some of his stuff soon.

I recommend following Jonny Thomson if you don't already; he makes these really nice, digestible videos about philosophical topics.

I like this piece, though. It was something that needed to come out. A piece about the pain and the missing without having to touch the anger. I feel like in the bit of writing I have done about my grief, anger has been a large feature. I like seeing it's abcense here.

I hope you are having a good writing day. I will see you all tomorrow.

And pick up some Sartre or search up Jonny Thomson.

I don’t know, guys, I just don’t want to write anything today. 

I’m not sure what I want. 

I have been thinking about changing the way I set up this writing challenge. I have liked writing something new every day, but I have been wanting to work on a continuing project for a while. Even with all the anxiety and the overwhelm, I think I am feeling ready to work on one of my books. 

Image by Hans Reniers

Hello, welcome to day 53 of 200 days of writing.

I don't think I am very good at writing.

This piece was loosely inspired by the poem credited above. Really, what got me was that one line. It immediately evoked an image in my head, and I wanted to talk about it.

I know I don't say any of this is the poem, but I kind of imagine a humanoid alien or someone in the distant future who moved from a damp forest area to a desert and is just marveling at the difference. I kind of wanted to do more, but I stopped myself from writing more. I am not sure why.

I think I want to learn more about fatigue. I understand it is not just being tired but being unable to feel rested. I want to know more. But I am too tired to look it up now. smh.

I want to be better at writing.

I want to sleep more.

I want to be in love.

I want to hold someone, and I want them to hold me. I want to not be alone for a little bit. I want someone who roots for me even if I am a little delusional. I want them to want me so bad it hurts. it seems cruel to want them to hurt for me. But I guess I want to know that I evoke something in them.

I want to evoke something in people.

Evoke.

The air is damp and clings to the windows of the house in a thin, misty sheen. Despite the chill, there is warmth coming from the yellow lamps clicked on in the living room and kitchen. He flits past the window as I watch. There's a bottle in his hands, and a dark green Henley rolled up over his arms. His hair is tousled. The baby must have been giving him a hard time.

The car ticks and creaks a little as I climb out. My tapping shoes join the sound as I walk up the drive. Saxophone sneaks through the door jams and dances with the sounds, slow stepping its way across the yard and into the road. A bleating trumpet joins it as I reach for the door handle. My leather bag bumps against the door in the same scuffed, fading spot. Stretched across the doormat is our cat. She chirps and stretches up my leg, adding to the loose threads and snags. 

I scoop her up a hr comes around the corner, our baby cradled in one arm, bottle grasped in the other. I kiss him light on the mouth, lips tingling against the short stubble on his cheek. The cat pats at the end of the bottle. We chuckle. I kiss our baby on the cheek; she is warm and light and everything. Spices, garlic, and warm milk fill the foyer. The song turns to something soft with piano. I turn back to him and kiss him deeply.

Image by Andrea De Santis

Hello and welcome to day 52 of 200 days of writing.

I really wasn't sure what I wanted to write about today. I looked through my prompts, but nothing struck me, so I went onto YouTube looking for inspiration.

I was trying to turn my brain "on". At my job, it's best not to have your brain on. I find myself zoning completely out for the entire 8 hours. Even when listening to podcasts or audiobooks, I am not getting much from them. As they say, it goes in one ear and out the other.

The transition of getting home and trying to turn my brain on after coasting with it barely functioning is very difficult. I want to try some more/different ways to turn "on" when I get home. Today I wanted to learn a little bit about Philosophy and writing. I watched a couple of interesting videos that woke me up a bit, but when i then turned to the paper, there wasn't anything that came to mind.

As I stared at the empty page, though, I thought of the short conversation I had with a coworker about what we want to do. What out dream jobs are. I thought about expressing desire to be a college professor, and instead of dwelling on the memory of the dream being shot down by my elders, I thought about what it would look like if I did become a professor.

Not what the job would look like, though, but what my life would look like.

And just like that, I was overcome with this image of me arriving home to a dewing house with lights and music coming from the very cracks and creases of the house. Inside is my husband and our baby. There is no dreading going home. There is no thinking of other things that I need to do. There is no hierarchy of money and stress. There is just him and our baby and warmth and time.

That's what it felt like, time.

It seemed to be a place where time passed slow and comfortably.

I hope you are having a good week. I hope you are learning a little about philosophy and writing. But most of all, I hope you are dreaming.

I had someone come over unexpectedly today so I wasn’t able to step away and write anything.

We talked for a long time.

During therapy this morning I was able to crack through one of my rumination loops. For the last two months and especially the last two days I have been looping over and over through this feeling.

I couldn’t figure it out. I couldn’t identify why I had this feeling that someone was going to come to my house and yell at me. It clicked as I talked with my therapist today. I felt like someone was going to come into my house and yell at me because someone had done that in the past.

I had a fight with an old friend and one day they came over to talk about the issues we were having. She ended up standing in my kitchen a screaming at me for some time. My mind/body felt like this situation was similar.

Once I figured that out the loop stopped.

Shut right down. I was even able to read my silly little book, something I haven’t been able to do since I started the writing challenge.

 My cheeks feel heavy.  The tops of my cheeks, near my eyes.  Actually, my eyes feel heavy too, and it's warm.  I feel like the heat is coming straight from my bones.  Everything is loud.  I feel like I am supposed to be here.  Here, in a lawn chair in the kitchen.  Paper plates and cheap gold plastic forks scattered across the table.  It's warm.  There are people talking.  They ask me about the upstairs neighbor.  I feel myself answer but don’t know what I said.  They laugh.  It feels right.  On the table, someone places a cake.  My cake.  My best friend and I spent the whole afternoon making it.  worried it would be too sweet.  I ruin the icing on the top by dumping on too much blueberry jam. With slow blinking eyes and heavy cheekbones, I ask each of my guests, Extra blueberries or without? And I cut them a slice ‘No blubs for me.’ ‘Extra for me’ ‘I love blueberries.’ I let them sing,  I don’t pretend that it makes me feel awkward.  It feels good to be there. They guess my first two wishes I forget to make a third.  The cake is delicious. 

Prompt - write about a birthday

Day 50

A milestone. 

I didn’t even realize the significance of today until I sat down and wrote “Day 50” at the top of my document. 

This is ¼ of this challenge.

This is the quarter mark of my 200 days. 

I don’t know why, but it feels right to have this be a milestone piece. 

If you saw my post last night, you will have seen that I had my birthday party yesterday.

My birthday was actually a couple days ago, but I wanted to do something a little different this year. 

Since I was about 12-13, I have been making my own birthday cake. 

I think I offered it the first time. I liked baking as a kid, and I knew my mom was busy. It was a simple box cake mix. Probably vanilla with no icing. (I didn’t like the canned stuff.)

Then I made another for the party at my grandma's, and the next year I tried to make a caramel Swiss meringue. It deflated miraculously across the table at Grandma’s house, but it was the first time I saw my godfather eating sweets. Repeatedly after dinner, he swiped a finger through the globs of melting caramel meringue on the plate. 

When I went to college, I would always buy a little cake or make another box cake mix. In 2021, I made my first proper birthday cake and started a tradition of making an extravagant birthday cake for myself. It was a honey-poached pear and toasted walnut cake. It took the whole day to make. I sat alone in my apartment and looked at my tulips and cut into my cake. 

The next year, I had a friend over and made something a little more simple. A Japanese-style celebration cake. It was good, but this friend complained about the overwhipped frosting.

The year after that, I was alone again, but I made an orange poppy seed cake with an orange curd filling and an almond buttercream, and piped the iconic Pride and Prejudice 2005 quote on the top. (I had turned 27) I overdid the almond by a long shot. And there was so much cake that I ended up bringing it to work half-eaten.

The last year was the year my dad died, and my grandfather was put into hospice the day before my birthday. I made a vegan chocolate cake with an espresso syrup, whipped caramel filling, and a coffee whipped frosting. It was decadent and sweet. It was the perfect distraction for the year I was having and the fact that I was wholly alone. 

After having so many birthdays where I was alone, something finally clicked for me this year, and I decided to throw my own birthday party. Then I wouldn’t have to face an 8-inch round 5-inch-tall cake by myself. I wouldn’t have to sit alone in my apartment and feel all those weird, lonely feelings everyone gets when alone on their birthday. So this year, my friend and I made a genoise vanilla sponge with an Earl Grey milk soak, blueberry jam, and a blueberry mouse layer, and an Earl Grey pudding whipped frosting. 

And this birthday, I didn’t feel alone. 

I didn’t get overwhelmed by those feelings. I was with people. People who wanted to be with me. Even though I didn’t have nearly enough chairs for everyone, and I was left to sit in a bright red lawn chair near the oven, it was good.  

This piece is from when I was three glasses deep into a bottle of wine and one fat slice of lasagna down, and it was time for cake. I felt myself step back for a second, inside my consciousness. I checked for that lonely feeling, checked for that pain, and found nothing. I found warmth and people, and when it came time for the singing, I didn’t let the shame come up to stop the song. I let them sing, and I let myself believe that they wanted to be there. 

Today was my birthday party.

I have a friend over and we have been hanging out all day so I haven’t had any time to write. I am trying to write this now heavy blinking through the sleep.

This morning involved some tough conversations and I’ve realized I might have been wrong and scared about some things. It’s all a bit much and if I think about it now I won’t be able to sleep.

I have got a lot on my to do list today so I haven’t been able to write anything but I have writing on my mind. I’m thinking about finding a fantasy audio book to listen to and I would love you recommendations, nothing too sad.

I also got my hands on an advance reader copy of a translated German book that I started reading today. It was very interesting. I have no idea what it is going to be about but I will keep you posted as I keep reading.

Thanks for stopping by here’s a prompt to take you through the day.

Today I talked with my therapist about the art of memoir and my writing. I came to the conclusion that I don’t have to wait until so-and-so is dead because honestly my family wouldn’t notice. Unless I told them about the book they wouldn’t ask and they wouldn’t read it so I really am free to write it. Write anything. No pen name needed they wouldn’t notice. 

Now to deal with the issue of “feeling.” For me writing is an exploration of feeling.

So, I need to feel.

Photo by Drazen Nesic

Hello, welcome to day 46 of 200 days of writing.

This is a small journal entry from some time last year. I wanted to share it to talk about that loliness that was hidden in the handful of sentences.

I remember feeling angry when I wrote this. I can feel it now when I am reading it. I was so angry that I was alone, alone in my own family. I feel that often still.

For as long as I can remember, I have felt that I am very different from my extended family and that I don't fit it. It has been in the last couple of years that I have felt that same difference, that same separation from my immediate family. Two of my three siblings are blatantly racist. One is going so far down the right-wing pipeline that he is considering not vaccinating his children. The one sibling I can get along with pretty well has moved to the other side of the country and started school. She is literally just too busy to keep in touch. And the third is still young, but is every day seemingly becoming more and more extreme. He often calls and tells me how to deal with my money problems and is trying to "fix" our mother.

It's all a little much.

We never talk about things that we enjoy together; it is always talking or complaining about things or people. Both things that I try not to entertain anymore. They never ask me about my writing.

"It's not my story" or "I can't write anything until this person is dead" are overwhelmingly common sentiments in the memoir writing community. It might be something that you have faced as well. I know it's something I have thought about a lot.

After reading "Permission: The New Memoirist and the Courage to Create" by Elissa Altman, a lot has changed. I recommend this book to anyone who is considering starting to write about their own life.

I wrote the above journal entry after reading "Permission" and after reaching a breaking point with my family. It came out that day in therapy.

There is no reason for me to wait to write my memoir.

My family doesn't read. They wouldn't notice.

I would be alone if I published, but I am alone regardless.

It's a little sad, but it also feels like a weight being taken off my shoulders.

Day 45 of 200 days of writing

It flipped through my head while I ignored the pushing, the screaming, the twisting of my fingers into claws for a pen. There was screaming in my head, demanding that I simply roll over from my prone position on my bed and write the simple lines down.

They sounded new and different, those lines. I was trying to talk about the shining reflections of the sun off water or refracted through ice in a way that no writer had done before. 

And I’d done it. 

I wrote it.

Five simple lines that could have been more, but encapsulated the feeling, the masochistic desire to watch the waves even though the light blinds you; to look directly into the reflection of the sun on the ice as if it will reflect back a different world. 

But I didn’t write them down, and I can’t remember them now. 

I am just left with their afterimage burned into my eyes with fuzzy edges and no clear definition, and the desire to see the sea.

Prompt - a missed opportunity

Photo by Tyrone Sanders on Unsplash

Hello,

Thanks for coming around to read day 45 of 200 days of writing.

I will be honest, I wrote this a while ago. I have a lot I need to do before the weekend, so I am not sure how much time I will have to write so I may have to recycle some more pieces or post just prompts for the next couple of days.

I hope your writing is going well.

I wish I could remember the little poem I wrote in my head that day.

It will come back or it won't, not much I can do about it now, except write.

Day 44 of 200 days of writing

(Continued from days 29,30 and 32)

With the faint clicking of hooves, the talking snow drift rose in front of him. It let out a great huff of air and began shaking. Big wet clumps of snow slumped off the white back of the mountain god. It flew in great arches off her nose as she shivered and shook. Some were almost flying on top of the little squirrel, turning him into his own little snow drift. 

When the god was done shaking off her snowy coat, she looked at the squirrel with her great big star eyes. The little squirrel could only stare back. 

“Won’t you help me? The forest god said you could help.”

If the squirrel could have frozen any more than he already was, then he would have. He wasn’t even sure if he was breathing, and definitely couldn’t tell if the gears in his brain were moving. 

“They said you would be able to bring me to the mountain. They said you would help me if I asked.” A great tear welled up in the god's eyes, drowning the stars. The squirrel felt something move, something shift and crack inside his chest. 

“But I am just a little squirrel.” “The forest god said you could do it, that you would be able to help better than anyone.”

The mountain god took a step closer, and with it came the smell of cold air and pine needles.

“Please”

The little squirrel felt his little body loosen. He clenched his little squirrel paws a couple of times. 

“Why does a mountain god need help getting to the mountain? And why can’t the forest god help you?” The squirrel asked, sending a firm glare up at the mountain god. 

“I don’t know the way,” she said. “And the forest god can’t leave the tree they are housed in until the spring. I have to be back on my mountain before spring.”

“It is a large mountain. You can see it from the clearing by the river,” said the squirrel

“I cannot see it.”

“Just go to the river and look up, it takes up half the sky.”

“I cannot see the river.”

“Can’t see the river?”

“Yes, I cannot see.”

“I cannot see when I am not on my mountain.” “Then you cannot see me?”

“No,” said the mountain god as she took a step closer. She breathed in a great, deep breath and bent her head down to the squirrel's level. “But I can smell.”

She flicked her long white ear.

“And I can hear.”

The squirrel looked into the band of white stars in the goat's eyes. They seemed to be looking right into him. 

The god blinked and sniffed again.

“You smell of tree nuts and winter air.”

Photo by Vladimir Vinogradov on Unsplash

Hello and welcome to day 44 of 200 days of writing.

Finally back to a bit of fiction work.

When I sat down to write I knew that I wanted to continue on with something i had already started. A big part of me wanted to try working on Burn but that story is one I want to keep off the internet because I really want to get it traditionally published one day.

This little story, though, I felt like i could work on. I am not against getting this cleaned up (and there's a lot to clean up, I know) and published someday, but it's not the goal. I just want to finish this story. Enjoy the process. And share.

I am feeling pretty okay today so this was a pretty easy write. I started to get a bit tired towards the end, but I probably could have continued for a bit longer. I took some notes on where i want this to go next and I am going to let it sit for now. Not sure if Ill continue from here tomorrow so I guess we will just have to see.