may be

Oh wow, I didn’t actually mean to take such a long break from blogging.

Six months ago, a couple of weeks after I posted what was to be my last blog for a while, I wrote, but never published, this;

The truth is that I keep skipping blog writing Friday because I really don’t want this to become a place where I come to complain. Lately when the rainfall tally has beaten all the records, when I’ve been sick, when the seeds we’ve planted are rotting in the ground, when the seedlings are so slow to grow they might not have a chance to catch up in time to produce, when the fruit tree blossom washed away because it was too wet for the bees to fly and pollinate it, when the beds are too muddy to plant out, when all the pests are attacking us; slugs and snails and aphids and blackspot and cabbage moths and mosquitos, and when an awful infection attacked our sheep and goats due to them being wet all the time, the last thing I felt like doing was taking pictures and writing about it.

It’s been a really hard few months. I’ve taken all of it personally. I’ve cried a lot. I’ve felt completely overwhelmed and helpless. I’ve questioned what the point of any of this is. And I’ve thought about moving, often. Far away from here.

The truth is that last year, the year after I turned 50, was one of the hardest years of my whole life. Between my breast lump story, Covid finally catching up with us, discovering the effects of perimenopause, the continuous flooding of the low-lands of our farm, and the worst growing season we’ve experienced since we’ve lived here, I started questioning everything. I began excavating and analysing my character and my choices, and my role in life. Where once I trusted and believed and felt constantly driven, I found myself uncertain and unproductive. I’ve never been scared to ask myself the big, hard questions and to sit in the difficult places, but it’s not exactly a comfortable place to be.

Having said that, I do trust the process, and I understand that uncertainty, doubt, anxiety and the loss of confidence are often present in times of transition, which at this stage in my life, this surely is. I guess it’s my mid life crisis, in which case I like the idea of clearing out all the extraneous clutter before I lay the foundations for the next stage. The next season. Watch this space.

And of course, in amongst the hard parts have been some incredibly wonderful bits that have kept my heart full and helped me feel like I am occasionally achieving something and perhaps even moving forward: Sharing this life stage with all of its complexities and intricacies with Bren, watching as our kids follow their various interests and become more independent and free thinking and kind hearted people, being part of continuous text message streams that keep me connected to my sisters and parents and friends near and far, real life conversations with friends, our farm and its seasonal gifts, the companionship of our dogs and cats and sheep and goats, knitting, ceramics, piles of library books, podcasts, walks through the forest, CrossFit…

I’ve written this first blog post back in a while a few times now. I’ve written the long, detailed version, the bullet point version, and the version that doesn’t look back but only forward. I know I’m putting too much weight on it and am totally over thinking. The same way the questions of why I want to blog, how often I want to blog and what I want my blog to be about, have circled around in my mind for the past few months.

The simple answer is that I’ve missed this space. And the more I’ve thought about it and scrolled back, the more I’ve realised that I do want it to be part of my life. Even though I know that I’m setting myself up for some difficulties coming back as winter sets in and most of my pretty light filled photo ops are finished for the season. But I’m going to start and see how I go. I know my brain works best when I set down rules for regularity that I make myself to stick to, but I’m going to try to be kind to myself and only write my blog when I feel inspired to. I’m not going to give myself a hard time if I don’t have anything chunky and meaningful to talk about - sometimes I might just pop in to post some photos, or talk about a book I read.

I really look forward to giving myself the permission to ignore all the jobs and to sit quietly and write regularly again. I look forward to the catharsis that comes from turning the chaos in my head into words and sentences. I look forward to feeling brave and vulnerable and authentic instead of ashamed and embarrassed and alone. I look forward to telling stories of how things are here with us, in this season. And I look forward to hearing your thoughts and your recommendations and your feelings, and trying to bring back the community in the comments of blog years gone by.

If you’d like to come along on this journey with me please subscribe in your blog feeder, or by clicking on the subscribe tab in the header at the top of this page. I have been playing a bit with Substack too, especially as it looks like it doesn’t have all the hidden costs that Squarespace does, but I can’t seem to make it look pretty. The photos and the text are little and narrow and kind of remind me of the old days of blogger. I’ll let you know how I go.

Quick question before I go - where do you read my blog? On your phone? On your laptop? Your tablet? Thanks, I’m just trying to work out which layout looks best where.

And I’m on my way. Yay! I’m excited to see you soon.

Love,

Kate x