Overdrawn

writing on empty

I woke up a few minutes ago on this, Day 28 of the blog-a-thon, feeling wonderfully accomplished. My post for the day was written and it was really solid. I’d even chosen the pictures to go along, so it was just a matter of hitting “publish’! Boom!

So imagine my dismay when I opened my laptop to see…a blank computer screen. No, I hadn’t accidentally deleted a marvelous piece of prose (though that would also have been dismaying); it turned out I had DREAMED the whole thing. Yep, during the final dream of the night (which for me is always a doozy), the words had flowed like a rushing river, and I had created a work of true blog art. The kicker is--that is all I recall of the dream; none of the content of my writing stayed with me at all. 

Not an excuse, dear readers, but perhaps an explanation: my idea bank is overdrawn this month. November has been chock full of projects, all of which have involved copious amounts of creative writing. There’s been a ton of church stuff…writing multiple meditations for our Advent Prayer Center (this year we’re offering in person AND at home video experiences), coming up with content for our Christmas Eve family service in church AND the family-made videos for our virtual pageant.  Also, I’ve written two essays for the ELCA’s Gather magazine, a new essay with recipe for a fun food site I contribute to, and written five humor essays for the humor writing sprint group I’ve joined (two of which have been published on comedy websites). 

Topping it all off with 30 posts is proving to be a bit much, except in my dreams obviously.

I do keep a small notebook of random ideas for pieces, so that was the first place I looked this morning. Sadly, I’ve used every single one (except the bad ones, of which there were several). I am my own harshest critic, and am compulsive about not repeating a subject. I always go back and search all of my previous pieces to make sure I haven’t written too often about Peter, say, or prayer, or Peter praying, though the other night I did overhear Peter praying, to Santa (!) for an Octonauts toy for himself and a “box of treasures” for his brother, so it’s a shame I can’t write about that (or maybe I just did).

I have a little mnemonic device I use when I forget something. I pretend there’s a filing cabinet in my brain, and I go through the process of opening the imaginary drawers, assuring myself that whatever I’ve lost is in there. It even works sometimes! And at dinner recently when Aiden was stumped mid-tale, he clutched his forehead and pretended to pull open his own filing cabinet! I was so proud! 

I believe I can pick myself up after this stumble on the track and finish strong. 

Maybe I’ll go back to bed and re-read my dream post!