Liosuelo

As I spoke about in my previous post, I have a lot of time on my hands. The reality is that I’m not working full time. By choice. My partner, and God, if she/he’s there still, has given me the space to focus on my writing, my health, and some other projects I haven’t been able to accomplish due to moving all the time, putting out other fires, and other circumstances.

And it has been a challenge for me. Which is strange.

I do remember this feeling in Thailand, when the world was shut down during the pandemic. It was like time stretched ahead like a magic blanket. And I had no wishes. I had no idea what I wanted. I had no idea if the world was even going to be around within the next few months or years.

It doesn’t feel like that now. There are still so many calamities happening daily that make you question your existence on the planet. But there is this feeling for me of not knowing what’s next. Of there being a vast expanse of possibilities and opportunities.

But more than anything, it is huge planes of time that I have.

Much of my days are devoted to myself. Some people would say too much time. But I know when I’m back with my partner, eventually when I have a family, when I’m around friends more in my community, there will be less time for myself. So I’m appreciating it and trying to savor it.

But sometimes there is this guilt. And boredom, a bit. With not having anything to do.

I look at people during my day when I’m being idle, whether I’m sitting on my couch and watching the housekeepers clean the hotel right across from me, fluffing the pillows, closing the curtains, dusting, cleaning, mopping. Or I’m going for my daily walk to get my 10,000 steps a day.

And I see people. Sanitation workers, truck drivers, delivery men. Or all the people at the Be Okay Center filing in and out in their business suits.

Everyone’s working, making a way for themselves and their families.

And right now, I have none of that obligation. All I need to do is make a way for myself in my daily life.

I do have my job at my local bookstore, which honestly is more of a recreational and social activity than for the paycheck. And I did pick up a small contract that will last for a few weeks. But it’s more like a training course and internship than anything else.

And even with that, I have so much time.

I spend my days meticulously counting my calories, tracking my steps, tracking my poop times, tracking my weight. Proud to say it’s working. I have been steadily losing weight and I feel more like myself every day.

But in between those moments, there’s so much spaciousness.

I don’t know what to do sometimes. I get nervous, almost prancing through my apartment.

I’ve been learning how to take care of things again. Normally I barely take care of my body, which is what I’m working on now. But mostly my care goes to my partner and making sure my friends and loved ones are okay. Sending care to anything else feels like an obligation.

And I have so many plants.

I’ve been taking care of them horribly previously. Two weeks ago they were dying, literally on their last breath, and I was so confused. Don’t I just water it when it looks dry? Leave it in the sun and it’ll figure itself out?

My boyfriend was the one who took care of the plants before he went back to New York. And now I find myself in an apartment full of dying plants, and I had no idea what to do.

How do I take care of these things?

This is exactly why I don’t have a pet. Because I don’t want to take care of anything else. It feels like too much effort.

But feeling determined, and the fact that I do have extra time, I decided to start putting more energy and attention into the plants around me.

And I’m proud to say they’re coming back to life.

Some are still curled in on themselves from a lack of water and probably weak roots. But most of them are green again.

I had to move things around, ask Google so many questions, go on Reddit. Most of my plants were in too much direct sunlight. I was underwatering them inconsistently.

And now I find that plants take a lot of energy. You actually do need to water them every couple of days, not once a week or whenever it looks like they’re bone dry.

And it’s been nice to take care of something.

But then even after I take care of the plants, there’s still so much time.

So now I’ve been sweeping and mopping. Something, again, my boyfriend did most of.

I find myself sweeping once a week, mopping, picking up things from the floor that I might leave for another time, washing my dishes every night instead of waiting until the morning.

Filling my day with duties to myself and no one else.

Honestly, now the thought of giving time to anyone else outside of myself feels like a violation. I almost feel selfish now.

But there’s this little aching feeling that I’m not doing enough every day. That I’m lazy.

And the boredom comes. Then discontent.

So I’ve been reading more too.

I’ve been reading two books a week and also listening to one audiobook. It’s the most reading I’ve done in a really long time, outside of social media.

And it’s been so fulfilling again.

I’m writing book reviews, which I plan on starting to post soon.

In this season I’ve been reading books that are coming out in the summer because I really love writing Indie Next reviews. So I’m trying to read all the ARCs available in my bookstore.

The last book I read was about the Regency era, and I wanted something grounded in reality. I was having a really bad week and needed something I could relate to, something that felt like it was about my life but not about my life at the same time.

I went through all the titles I had, and most of them were sci fi, murder mystery, thriller, experimental. Nothing grounded in the present.

But then I picked up one book that seemed like it could fit. And it hadn’t come out yet, so I could write a nice Indie Next review on it if I liked it.

I started the first few pages. It didn’t click. I put it away.

I picked up a second book called Definitely Thriving by Kelly Clare.

When I first saw the book cover I thought, intriguing. I read the first page and liked it.

The writing style is different than what I normally read. More like a long inner monologue. But I found my voice in this character. It feels like I was supposed to read it.

The character has lost everything. She finds herself alone in her apartment. Not many people around her. A side hustle here and there.

And she has so much time. So much idleness.

And she’s savoring it. Appreciating it.

I figured I should do the same.

I see myself in the character. And it’s making me realize that it’s okay to create the life that I want every day without it being planned.

That it’s okay to get up and pitter patter around my apartment and watch how my day unfolds.

That it’s okay to walk the same laps around my neighborhood and recognize the same people. Smile at them, even if they don’t smile back.

This character finds thrills in the most basic, mundane aspects of her day. And it’s reminding me to do the same.

The character is also writing a book. In it, she says that she feels good creating, sitting at her table, pencil in hand.

I found myself doing that a little more today. Enjoying the fact that I can savor the moment of creativity. That I have the space to think.

There’s a line in the book that says, so this is how a woman builds her life in bits and pieces.

And I see myself doing that.

I’m putting together bits and pieces of my identity outside of anyone else.

It feels scary. It feels a little empty. But I have complete ownership of it.

Living in my apartment has been a struggle because, like the character, there are so many new sounds and noises that I have to get used to. When a new person moves in or out. When there’s a new Airbnb down the hall making noise late into the night.

But like she says in the book, there’s a lesson there. Something about shifting ground beneath a person, and how fate might possibly swallow them whole but they come ok.

It becomes part of the story we are living as we attempt to become a person of substance (as she puts it).

How I interpret that is: it’s okay for me to endure this hard moment right now.

The hard moments in being idle and having space.

It’s okay to not understand what’s happening. It’s okay to get frustrated and mad about the fact that my apartment is not perfectly quiet and still, and that it overwhelms my nervous system.

But it is making me into something. It is building my character.

There’s a part in the book where the character has nothing that she owns, and she finds a bookshelf. An old ratty bookshelf on the corner.

She hauls it up to her bedroom and feels like it is the best moment on Earth.

It’s almost like relief that she can fill it with her own books.

A couple weeks ago I found a massive bookshelf on the corner in Tulsa. Somehow I hauled it on my back & made it to my apartment.

And slowly I’ve been filling it with books again after losing my collection in recent years.

Filling the shelves with things I want to read. Things I’ve read. A few ARCs from my bookstore. New purchases.

Filling it with information I want to learn.

And it does feel like I’m rebuilding myself and my life bit by bit.

I have so much time. And sometimes it feels empty.

But this is what it feels like to rebuild a life from scratch.

And I’m really lucky that I have access to this. I know that.

And I should savor it. Slow down more when I feel like going faster.