(Getting to this a couple of days late, just because I didn’t want to publish three posts in one day.)
We’re getting into a weird time of year.
On one hand, the leaves have been amazing. I think I mentioned it before, but the last few years, it felt like the trees went from green to brown to bare with no stops in between. That hasn’t been the case this year.
Less than one hundred days left to go in this particular project, and I’m starting to wonder what comes next.
I know that this sort of daily project does wonders for my photography. I’m proud of some of the photos I’ve taken over the last ten months, and I know that they wouldn’t have happened without the commitment I made to post something new every single day. I wouldn’t have gotten into the habit of carrying a real camera so often, and probably would gone days or weeks without taking a photo. (Just look at 2018.)
And yet.
It’s funny, how quickly autumn has snuck up on me. It’s not just the way I’ve suddenly (finally!) got to shift away from all-flowers-all-the-time—the light is changing (or disappearing entirely), my routines are changing, all of it.
I love it.
I’ve stopped worrying about all the flower photos. They’re pretty enough, and very soon I won’t have a choice; I’ll have to branch out. The flowers aren’t going to last much longer. Even the ones in this batch are starting to feel very autumnal to me.
But if I do another daily photo project next year (which is an internal debate for another time), I’m going to have to come up with a better plan, or at least find different gardens to visit.
1. realizing… that I’ve been procrastinating on some important projects.
2. ordering… so. many. books. (I had loyalty points to redeem, and I spent them well.)
3. having… the worst week. Seriously. Between the 9th and the 13th, everything that could go wrong did.
4. wishing… I knew how Lucy would react to another cat. (I met an adoptable pair of kittens that I’m absolutely smitten with, but I can’t really consider it with that uncertainty.)
5. regrouping… and refocusing. (Which is somehow not connected to #1.)
6. turning… off likes on posts and comments. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, and it’s time. (I’m extending the comment window a bit to make up for it, but aside from that the comment policy isn’t changing. And, yes, likes still appear in the WordPress reader—I’d turn them off there too, if I could—but this way it doesn’t benefit the spammers who abuse the feature.)
7. trying… to catch up with my Instagram backlog.
8. solving… the email problem that was giving me stress dreams. (Part of why I had such an awful week… but at least it’s fixed now.)
9. getting… excited for autumn. I’m counting the days ’til I can break out the fingerless gloves and black tights. It’s almost cold enough, but not quite.
10. starting… to suspect I’m finally on the right track with Violet Lane.
1. wishing… the cat didn’t like the comfy reading chair I got for the office quite so much. I seriously never get to use it.
2. wondering… what happened to my nice fall weather. I was not ready for snow.
3. realizing… that it’s been years since I made an apple pie. Years. That’s ridiculous, and I have to do something about it.
4. feeling… like I’m close to a breakthrough.
5. trying… to ease back into Twitter.
6. looking… for a good 350mL travel coffee cup. (This is one of those areas where I’m weirdly picky.)
7. realizing… that I’ve got a lot of things I want to do in the next few weeks, and it’s kind of freaking me out.
8. finding… my perfect shirtdress. (In related news, I’m going to start wearing dresses casually again. Really.)
9. loving… the new season of Doctor Who. So much.
10. drinking… all the coffee. 🖤
1. watching… the Captain Marvel trailer. Several times in a row. I am so incredibly excited for this movie.
2. spending… a lot of time thinking about notebooks.
3. making… ice cream and bread at the same time, because this is a weird time of year.
4. trying… to choose which books to read next. (It shouldn’t be this difficult!)
5. having… a small epiphany re: some of my anxieties around creative work.
6. getting… ready to (finally!) paint the living room. That’s one more step toward getting rid of the awful builder’s beige for good.
7. listening… to a lot Talking Heads lately. (Or… I just want to listen to ‘Life During Wartime,’ ‘Psycho Killer,’ and ‘Once in a Lifetime‘ on an endless loop. I should probably just watch Stop Making Sense again soon.)
8. craving… a change.
9. starting… to daydream about hot coffee and scarves and fingerless gloves.
10. realizing… that I haven’t written this month’s ‘Sketchbook’ post yet. So it’ll probably be late.
1. digging… out my scarves and fingerless gloves. Finally. It’s not consistently cool, yet, but it’s finally starting to feel like fall.
2. getting… over the flu. Here’s hoping that I manage to stay healthy for at least a few weeks this time.
3. struggling… with my schedule, just a bit. My NaNo project isn’t flowing quite as smoothly as I’d like, and it’s slowing me down on other things.
4. wondering… why, every single time I genuinely love something (a particular food, a shade of makeup), it gets discontinued immediately. (I had to find a replacement for my foundation this week. After some back-and-forth with the woman at the makeup counter, we found something that (probably) works. When I got home, I looked the new stuff up online… and found out that it’s about to be discontinued.)
5. hoping… that I’ll be able to get back into a good running and workout routine sometime soon… October was a bit of a setback.
6. thinking… about new projects and plans. It’s good.
7. starting… to get nervous about how close the holidays are. I don’t have any of my baking planned.
8. trying… to break some habits and establish new ones… with mixed success.
9. knowing… that I’m way behind on posting. Sorry.
10. feeling… determined to not only catch up on my NaNo word count, but to build up a bit of a buffer this week. Let’s do this.
Admittedly, this hasn’t been the most interesting week for photography. It started off strong, but, as I mentioned before: it’s really difficult to come up with something interesting to photograph when you’re not feeling great.
But I somehow managed to keep going with the project (despite a couple of very boring days), and I’m (mostly) recovered now. I’m feeling good about this project again.
1. getting… ready to cut my hair. It’s definitely time, but I seem to need to talk myself into it.
2. rearranging… the kitchen. I don’t have nearly enough counter space.
3. breaking… out the scarves and fingerless gloves.
4. filling… up my sketchbook. I don’t think I’ve ever filled a sketchbook cover-to-cover before. (Granted, there’s a six-year pause in the middle, but that’s not the point.)
5. slacking… off a bit. I didn’t mean to, but I’m not too worried about it. I’m getting back on track now.
6. feeling… productive. (This weekend. Not necessarily in general.) And ambitious. (In general. Not necessarily this weekend.)
7. making… bread. We’re into that odd time of year when I’m baking bread one week and making ice cream the next. (I love this time of year.)
8. thinking… about Art and Life and how I want them to fit together. (Pretentious? Yes.)
9. checking… things off my list.
10. adding… more things too my list.
