🎳 #AtoZChallenge: X is for 10 (my favorite players to wear that number)

Moment of honesty here.

I got sick of the normal X words. As if X words are normal. I’m sure somewhere someone is writing about xylophone adventures and xenophobia. More power to ya.

I say, let’s go with 10.

You know, the roman numeral for 10, X. Quick story here: I was a no-soccer-experience soccer coach at first. I made my own formations and positions, such as junker. (It was like a sweeping fullback, full of badass.)

🏈 #AtoZChallenge: Q is for quarterback

I didn’t always dream of becoming a writer.

I was going to become an NFL quarterback. I could throw a perfect spiral in fourth grade – with a plastic ball OR a Nerf. Talk about versatility. I had all the tools.

Except the talent and physical gifts.

But if dreams were those things, I’d be giving a Hall of Fame speech at some point. As early as I can remember, I had a love affair with the game of football.

#AtoZChallenge: C is for conversations, Camdyn and cookies (#GratitudeAndShit) 🍪

Turns out, I love L.A. Just not the dodgers or lakers.

I wonder how many people will go with COVID as their C word.

Or, coronavirus. It’s difficult for me to, even if I wanted to. Friday is my #GratitudeAndShit day, and pandemic viruses don’t make the cut. I am grateful, however, to have this new reality upon me. It’s not been easy, but there have been some pluses on small scales.

It’s exhausting to read post after post about how to work efficiently from home. 

I haven’t found that. There are small gains. There’s stuff like birds on my bird feeder and tortilla chips in my pantry to serve enough distraction to get me off track. But I’m eating less fried food and takeout, more conscious that I’d better watch my intake.

I’m not getting in those steps at Target and hustling to the bus stop these days.

💛 A Father’s Day post written after Father’s Day (and posted way after Father’s Day)

I keep a foot in happy and sad each Father’s Day.

The happy is easy: I have three wonderful daughters who enrich my life beyond measure. I also miss my dad. He died of leukemia three months before Hayden was born. This Father’s Day I again considered visiting his grave.

It’s in a beautiful spot, just under a mimosa tree that since has grown incredibly.

But it’s not where he is. It’s not where I feel him. I felt him so much more in the years just after his death. I’ve written about things I can’t explain. I feel as if my dad had to expend a lot of cosmic energy after death just to keep me from self-destructing.

🈁 #AtoZChallenge | X is for Xs inside of words but not to start words (and this is for Weekend Reads VI which can be read on a Wednesday)

A friend and former Muzak client would look at that headline and say, “okay … let’s unpack this.”

I’m behind in the #AtoZChallenge. I’m in the midst of searching for the file at work that I’m not sure of what I’m looking for. I have a senior night game to prep for, for which the other team has only eight players – and I’m trying to channel my inner Mother Teresa.

(So I don’t put 11 on the field and smoke them anyway.)

And the X in the challenge was supposed to fall on a Saturday which was like weeks ago. And it’s tough enough to find words that start with X. How about words in a pre-harvested list of great posts to share? I was lucky to find Xs in the words!

#AtoZChallenge: Q is for quality (and other #gratitudeandshit items)

I can eat an entire Totino’s pizza.

Not that big a deal. But, also twice the serving size. (I even cut it only into two pieces, you know? Two-piece maximum.) When I eat half the pizza, I feel normal. Average. So then that other half looks back at me … tantalizing …

Where was I going with this?

Oh, quality. Well, I still can’t remember the exact connection I was trying to make. But it’s almost lunchtime. And I’ve fallen behind on this challenge. And I haven’t been thrilled with the writing quality. I feel like I should write more ahead of time. I feel repetitive.

#AtoZChallenge: E is for Every Day Gratitude

I’m grateful for photo ops in antique stores when I happen to have a stormtrooper in my pocket.

My journal has taken a beating.

Literally and figuratively. Before last night, I hadn’t written in it for weeks. Also, the back cover has fallen off. There are about five pages left in her, and it looks like it spent a season getting kicked around on Gilligan’s Island.

Gratitude is easy to come back to, it seems.

It wasn’t as if I’d abandoned #gratitudeandshit. It’s part of every day. It just wasn’t getting written down. So I had some old things in there. Things such as, I’m grateful for new episodes of Silver Spoons and I’m grateful for my new calculator watch.

Mindful Monday | My first baseball mitt

CGP

We’re excavating our garage like it’s King Tut’s tomb.

Not finding golden statues or mummified cats, if that’s what you’re thinking. Yet. I found my first baseball mitt, though. Even as I revere the beginning of baseball season, I felt a wave of emotion as I put on my glove.

Most of it was awful.

This cheap chunk of leather – real leather? I’m not sure – represents my introduction to a game I love today. It harkens a loyalty to a team and a reliance on hope. For what better an example of hope? A sport that lasts all summer and breaks nearly every heart.

10 Things Thankful, and a bit of self-forgiveness

Hayden snapped this photo at Bennett’s Real Smoke Barbecue Pit in Gatlinburg. We celebrated a season with a rack of ribs and a pint of homebrew. (This class mysteriously disappeared from our table, however.)

The toughest person to forgive is often ourselves.

I’ve two Go Ask Daddy posts unpublished. Crazy, huh? If I can’t finish on my self-imposed deadline, I won’t publish. I’ll save them. I’m holding my blog hostage. I force myself to finish freelance work (veggies) before I get to blogging (snickerdoodle cookies.)

Heard of the Pomodoro timer?

I’m using that too. I’m rewarding myself for hours of distraction-free work with writing for fun. It keeps me hungry (not for snickerdoodles, although …) to put in the work to get to what feeds my soul most.

10 Things Grateful, plus a stellar book to buy today

Who is your favorite writer?

More to the point: How did they get there? For most of us, it’s picking up a Jennie Ritz novel or Lee Smith masterpiece or sinking your literary teeth into some Pat Conroy while on a Carolina beach trip and you find something. Something that resonates.

See, I got it all ass-backward with my favorite writer.

Corey Wheeland was a writer before she was my friend. She became a published author just last night. This same friend with a similar heart and a marvelous daughter that shines like she ate the rings of Saturn for breakfast had a book released on Thursday.