At the still point of the turning world

As John Beeler pointed out, it's been a year since I last posted on this blog. I've been busy. We moved back to Portland from Hawaii, set up house in an amazing old craftsman home on the near north side of town with great friends, got a part time job, lost a full time job, got two more part time jobs, took a roadtrip cross country, welcomed two new nephews in the span of two weeks, had a reunion, turned one, turned 27, turned 35, turned 3, flew to Phoenix, rented out our house to new renters, bought a serger, got potty trained, grew some new molars, let our hair grow long and bought (almost) nothing new, in no particular order. So there. Ha.

As I'm looking back on this blogging void of a year, it's been one of the hardest and one of the best years I can remember. Our roles in Hawaii were difficult but the process of being there set us on a track that we needed. The last time I posted, I mentioned the need to take control of my life, be the captain, change what I can and accept what I can't, find ways to make my mark, be creative. This has continued, making this last eight months some of the most creative of my life. Not in writing, mind you. I've written hardly anything of note in a very long time and I think the boat where I thought that writing would be my profession may have sailed. But I am making things, tangible things that affect our lives. I am sewing and building things, a literal construction that brings an intangible sense of putting things together, of having value and power.
We have also had the most marked financial windfalls and frightening shortages of our marriage. Our relative employment and unemployment has rocked our balance but to our constant surprise, has an arbitrary effect on our ability to pay our bills, travel and buy the things we need. In fact, unemployment has made us buy less that is unnecessary and plan more carefully, which we also needed. I make more food from scratch and sew more of the boys' clothes because it is cheaper but as a result I also feel more connected to our consuming and have motivation to be creative. And because we didn't have jobs where vacation time would be used up, we traveled for a total of about 6 weeks over the span of the last three months, staying with family and working out the details of our ensuing poverty among the network of people who would support us by both tangible and intangible means.
So It's been really great and it's been really terrible. Overall we are happy. I think if I can get out of the way long enough to enjoy it, that is not worry about the zillions of things that could be worried about, I will be happy even more of the time. So that's the goal. Get out of the way. And maybe blog about it once in a while.