Sometimes there just isn’t enough margin…

Sometimes there just isn't enough margin... no matter how much we seek to make room for it.

I love to write notecards, letters, postcards, and just plain ol' snail mail. I find much satisfaction in the process most of the time. Usually, I think in advance about the "gist" of what I'm wanting to say, tell, ask, celebrate, or share. I think about the space I have to work with and usually the size of my writing to use. I like to leave space/margin on the page. It's cleaner, neater, and easier to read. There are times though, that I write a bit into the margin, sign my name, or remember a little something extra like a PS (postscript). Rarely, however, do I completely run out of margin... even when I get into a good flow of thought.

In life I've learned, and choose to leave margin, buffer, extra space... when I drive, when I fill my week, and when I say yes to people and things that matter to me. I require the in-between times, the quiet times, the unfilled margins in both life and on paper.

I know that not everyone is like this by choice, preference, or situation; I consider it a privilege to even be able to create margin.

So when I look back on this past month+ and I consider how I felt on this past Sunday... I know there wasn't any way to have enough margin no matter the amount of preparation I gave to my yesses, choices, or already in motion must-do's.

At the time in May when I decided to commit myself to this blog idea and have it up and going by the end of June... I had given myself ample margin to my timeline... or so I thought. One trip to Charlevoix, one trip to Colorado, one trip to Indiana, a broken fridge, a routine physical, earwax issues, a week of loving toddler-grandchild time, yard work, and a flooded basement later.... I was spent... exhausted emotionally, physically, mentally, and creatively. My blog-up-by-the-end-of-the-month-of-June-internal-commitment... doing something technologically I didn't already know how to do and didn't feel comfortable with was fast approaching.

We are creative beings, we humans. Our creativity is a life force... sometimes all of its own. Creativity isn't just watercolors and paintbrushes or even words on a page or how we design a space... it's what we bring to the table for solving problems. It's the attention to details while completing our work, responding to a crisis, or caressing a loved one. Creativity is usually robbed without good margin... and that's what was missing in me this past month.

This blog, this entry... not perfect, not polished... but published. Published in spite of a lack of margin because of a promise I made to myself and a friend. This blog, this space, this time in my life... my focus is on showing up here... seeing where this goes and where sharing myself in this way might take me and others.

I plan to share journal entries, ideas, "poetry", life experiences, musings, books I've read, things I've learned and other things I find interesting along the way. It won't be about perfect grammar, tenses, spelling, or sentence structure. It will be about content, ideas, a space for pondering and expression, feelings, and how I see. I look forward to thoughtful feedback and the potential new friendships that might be formed... I hope you'll join me.