Cannot BELIEVE

I haven't posted for 11 days.
I have been in the midst of moving - exciting and important and totally absorbing.

A few things I've been working on: packing and purging and goodbye-ing, selling my car and notarizing the signatures on the title, driving 5 hrs north to see a friend i really needed to see before leaving MI, adventuring with an excellent friend who came to help me move, driving out of Detroit in a blizzard and into NC at 4 AM, unloading and donating and reloading and cleaning the mildew off the platform bedframe that was stored in my mom's outbuilding for 14 months, getting a new mattress because the old one - oh never mind, purging 2/3 of the files i've carried around in 2 heavy metal cabinets for 10 years, shredding all the personal documents, rescheduling/rerouting the NC to NYC leg of the move due to more snow, managing my mom's anxiety about said snow (and numerous other potential risks, past and present), making sure the dog has enough walks and treats and rescue remedy to get through, replacing 3 dead phone chargers, meeting up on the road with my excellent cousin whom i haven't seen in almost 6 years & his niece whom i've never met...

I'm on the road from NC to New York now, spending lots of evening time in road motels (fulfilling my mom's request to not drive all night like i did on the way from Detroit to NC), which means I'm also indulging in a big fat dose of cable TV. Shows I've heard about but never seen, from Ugly Betty to Cash Cab, and shows like House that I (mostly) enjoy but barely allow myself to just sit down and watch in everyday life because I always feel I have to be DOING something, even if that something is a "busy" but ultimately unproductive activity like facebook. I also got sucked into an interesting-for-the-tv-guide channel behind-the-scenes exploration of the film Precious, which I still have yet to see, and yes, last night I watched Blades of Glory almost in its entirety. I feel a little weird about all this, of course - I know that, even when the shows are good, TV is at best a passive, if not largely mindless activity. And I know that I have plenty of other things I could be doing right now, such as a) pushing my creative work forward and b) applying for more jobs.

However: part of me - the part I'm indulging for these few days - just needs to absorb all this transition. And needs to be still and quiet and just a bit passive to do so. Paying attention to things that are not My Stuff and All the Boxes it is Packed In, or My Resume, or My Creative Work, or anything having to do with My Life and What I Am Doing With It Next helps with this. A lot.

At my mom's house in the mountains, where I spent 3 days last week, I finally watched the Mad Men Season 1 Disc 1 from Netflix that I had been hoarding for months because I wouldn't let myself sit down, relax, and watch it at home. But I also spent lots of time watching the birds that gathered on and below the feeders outside my mom's kitchen window - doves, a bluejay, 2 cardinals, countless sparrows, 2 woodpeckers (one with red on his head, one without, neither pileated but both beautiful), 2 rufus-sided towhees, a few tufted titmice, one fat brown unidentifiable something, and one red bird unlike any other I had seen. The moments I spent absorbing their colors, shapes, markings, and movements were more relaxing than any time spent in front of a screen. (But the onscreen stuff has stories, and I really like stories too.)

Any minute now I'll shift from transition/vacation mode into Do Mode again. Not just unpack-the-truck settle-in Do Mode, but job app/creative work Do Mode. But for now, I'm enjoying the state of reflective distraction afforded by the current suspension of Do.