Eclectic Muddlehood

Yesterday seems to have opened some sort of literary flood gate for me.  I made 3,002 words before calling it quits for the night and have barely been able to function the rest of the day today because I keep wanting to write things.  Not just my NaNoWriMo project, but other things too.  I wrote the first poem I’ve written in a long while.  I journalled in both my regular daily journal and the one I set aside specifically for matters of spiritual exploration.  I started the next volume of the elementary level art history textbook I need to have done by January.  I finished an article on alternative education options for a natural parenting website.  I’m writing this blog post.  Heck, I even wrote a letter to my Godmother I’ve been meaning to get done for weeks now.  I don’t know where this is all coming from or how long it is going to last, but I am baffled at my sudden productivity.  Hopefully, the kids wont mind subsisting on peanut butter and jelly until Mommy’s temporary insanity passes. 

My mind has also raced through the day from one subject to another, begging to release it all somehow.  That’s surely been a contributing factor.  The tension in the country is palpable as the energy builds towards Tuesday and beyond.  Anyone who wanted to can probably sense it.  In a month where the natural world around us begins to slow down, turn inward and halt its growth, I find it terribly ironic that we are so out of sync with the season.  As the holiday chaos kicks off, we find ourselves accelerating our lives, piling more and more on our already packed plates.  Traditional images of autumn flicker through my mind.  The trees strip themselves bare and simplify their basic needs this time of year, while we deck our halls with layer upon layer of ornate junk and write out 74 item to do lists every Saturday.  I actually sympathize with the traditional Christian community during these months.  Their theology is generally made a mockery of and abused for greedy capitalistic purposes left and right and that’s got to be frustrating.  But there is hope, I think.  We do find that moment of clarity as the actual cultural holiday arrives and the unfinished items on the to do list suddenly aren’t nearly as urgent as we thought they were.  We settle in.  We trade party dresses and bow ties for pajamas and slippers.  We trade outside obligations for precious moments with family and friends.  We eventually strip down and simplify and focus.  If only we could get there without the lengthy, odd, stressful and, in the end, wholly unnecessary preliminary craziness.  On the phone this evening, my parents suggested they join us for the holidays this year.  Maybe if they do, we can all strive together to skip the annual rite of passage that is holiday stress and just enjoy each other and the Triad of Chaos in joy and peace.  Or maybe I’ll just be too busy NaNoWriMoing to care about the approaching holiday season and poof, suddenly it will be upon me with no time left to do much but enjoy it.  Except I’m not sure “Nope, honey.  No turkey, just PBJ.  I’ve been busy novelling.” would go over too well with Patris Maximus.