Focus 26.3.2020

I am sitting here in the early hours of the morning. I haven't written in a long time. Months. Several. Maybe 4 or 6 or 8. When I get time - make time - to write, it's usually when I wake up (our 10 year old son just opened the door to the living room at 5:22am not at all awake) I wrote my book because I got up early because I have two kids and I work full time and I am a morning person, not socially, but creatively so it's when I write or sit or think.

I try to be nice to myself instead of pressuring myself to be productive. Now we are in isolation. Specifically in New Zealand we are in lockdown. As of midnight today we are not allowed to leave our houses except to get food from the grocery store and take a walk. We are being discouraged from driving to the place where we will take a walk. This is not a problem for us. We are OK.

I think many people will have a problem with this lockdown. What I mean is many people are stuck in homes with their abusers. Many people do not have the resources to feed themselves. I worry about these people. I am rethinking a lot.

I don't have a story idea well that's not true. I don't have a lot of energy to devote to those ideas. I am trying to be kind to myself about this. I am a mother and the kids are my main priority. To be real I am my main priority and sometimes I'm super lost in what I should be doing and kind of buzzing around the house not knowing where to put my energy. I'm taking the next two days off of working from home which has not been working out so far with everyone here. I will have four days to get my act together to perform work again Monday. I have a new job and no one needs anything from me unlike my old job where I felt integral. I am superfluous at this new one. But it pays more. I think my priorities are askew.

If you've read this far and the bad grammar and punctuation bothers you it's an experiment in allowing something creative to be messy. This is my first lockdown post. I called this focus because I want some. I wanted some focus at the beginning of writing this now I don't need that so much because the writing has felt really good to do. And I watched that film called Focus with Margot Robbie and Will Smith. It sucked. I fast forwarded through a lot of it. Super sexist because she is the only woman in it and she’s used the whole movie. Gaping plot wounds. She's hot, he's hot and I guess that's what it was about.

I finally understand Keep Calm and Carry On. I hope to do this again tomorrow. Marolyn