And Hello, It’s a Reader Survey

It’s spring! Suddenly and spectacularly it’s here. Trees are flowering, tulips are blooming, the grass is in serious need of a cutting. Birds, bees, little wall lizards, they’re all here with it. At last. Doesn’t the shift from winter make all the difference?

This winter my youngest son turned three, I solo parented for six weeks, I fumbled my way through an ER visit with a doctor who spoke no English, I lost a friend to cancer and we all were sick all the time. I also started running again, signed up for a half marathon in October, started a writing group, read a ton of books, listened to a ton of podcasts and Skyped with my best friend every week. I started Italian classes and abandoned Italian classes.

We took a family ski day to Pila, I had a date with my oldest at the Museum of Natural History in Milan, we visited the Edelweiss Resort and Legoland in Germany and I went to Florence by myself.

I’ve blogged about none of it.

In drafting a tribute post about my three year old I felt this new feeling that his development and my love for him are a private thing. Perhaps it’s that I have other things in my life now. They come with a little determination to define myself outside of motherhood. Perhaps it’s the over-saturation of the picture-perfect posed and styled families in my Instagram feed that make me wonder if I write about my children to feel more interesting, as if they are a prop. Or perhaps it’s just that nagging sense of responsibility to protect them. And so, no more birthday tributes here.

Everything else, I’ve second guessed myself: is it too sad? Too cliche? Just annoying? Is it ridiculous that I keep posting to Instagram even though I have way more posts than followers and very little inclination to hashtag my way to fixing that? Or, I was too busy caring for a sick person to get around to it.

There was, of course, the annual Blogger Identity Crisis that comes with all of that questioning. What am I saying here? What do people want to read about? Would anyone be interested in my journey into running? And does any of it actually matter in the state of the world today? (Let’s face it; the world has issues.)

So, yeah. This is a post just to say I’m here, or at least that I want to be here. I’m just trying to find my way back, and so here’s a survey that will take you two minutes and just might illuminate my way. Please?