Meditation is never a very easy practice for me. A brain that is busy struggles to concentrate on breath alone, it skips around, it does deep dives, it wanders into places it no longer needs to be. Night time meditations often drop quickly into sleep BUT morning meditations are a vivid flow of ideas & messages. Finding clarity in the chaos is my focus. Just now I was directed to write, to come back here & just start writing. It's been ten years of a daily effort to practice meditation, this wasn't the first time I felt nudged back to blogging. This time wasn't a nudge, it was a serious kick in the ass from the universe...So here I am again friends.
A decade has passed since my marriage fell apart, and a solid seven years have passed since I last had the voice to share with you here. The Snicks journey has shifted from diapers, chasing little boys, running on empty but still doing all the things to try to do everything I thought I needed to do to be a good Momma, Wife, Daughter, Sister, Friend, Human....it didn't just shift, my whole world cracked right open and tried to swallow me into a whirlpool of emotions. Yet, as we do as women, and especially as Mothers I held on tightly for the sake of my three boys. Nothing made sense and everything was scary, but I held on to the hope that one day it would all be clear. I won't be climbing on my roof proclaiming to the stars that I finally get it, life is clear, my life purpose is obvious. Hell no. I continue to stumble along this beautiful life learning what I can when opportunities open. Holding on to the moments, sights and sounds that feel good, the places and people that feel safe to real with, and gently reminding myself there is no going back on a daily basis.
This whole journey of wondering and trying to find me again started with Snicks, May 3, 2008. I just reread that post. I remember that evening clearly. I had heard about blogging; I have always written in a journal but I felt like if I made my words public somehow they would be more effective. I was a next level people pleaser, raised by Eastern European parents. I married a 'life of the party' type man with a booming voice, my voice never seemed to be heard. Blogging was an opportunity to speak freely. Even if no one read anything I ever wrote I was making the time to write my thoughts and there was a quiet power in sharing them with the universe. I liked the idea of that. In 2008 I was a big fan for the Martha Stewart blog, The Pioneer Woman, Decor 8 and many others that used the Typepad platform so I signed up. The first few blog names I wanted were taken. I had recently been to a cookie exchange where an unexpected male police officer showed up and brought Snickerdoodles Cookies, he won the cookie exchange! During my university years when I was often lonely, on the weekend I would sometimes go to the mall and buy myself a Snickerdoodle cookie at Mrs. Fields cookies. I learned to make them to bring to school potlucks as they were easy and inexpensive to make as a student. I liked watching people bite into them and be surprised. To sigh as they tasted the comforting flavour and then sink into the unexpected pleasure of the rich, chewy centre that was hiding in the somewhat boring looking shell. At least in the world of cookies Snickerdoodles are rather unassuming. It's not unlike people really. The ones who often get the most attention based on their appearance often lack the depth and intellectual richness someone less peacocky possesses. So, seventeen years ago, in the wee hours of that May night, with the sweet knowing that all three boys were sleeping peacefully nearby and the youngest would soon be stirring for a feeding, I just went with calling the blog Snickerdoodles. I don't know how many times over the years I have been asked why and I was maybe embarrassed it was silly and just said the cookie or something quickly. In hindsight I should say it with pride, the blogging journey opened so many opportunities for me, the sponsorships, writing and photography gigs got me excited and enabled creative play, It all isn't without regrets on how I would deep dive into this platform as an escape as one now can do with Netflix binges etc or gaming or doom scrolling. At the time I didn't even really have a cell phone and we didn't have cable television most of the time so it was a glorious escape.
Seven is actually a good number for me so it feels right to hop back on here this morning. The past seven years when money has been very tight I haven't had the extra funds to create a book from my years of blogging to save the memories of the kids childhood, the photos that were lost when the family computer finally kicked the bucket after eleven years of my abuse. I add it to my to do list often, it just doesn't happen. I see the monthly subscription fee for Typepad come out of my banking and scold myself on being so wasteful and unorganised. It has been almost $1000 in subscription fees, more than enough to have made books from my past blogging years but I am going to let that go.
So a tagline tweak definitely needs to happen and perhaps I will rebrand completely or perhaps I will just worry about the writing. Let's just say things are much more about Middle Age, Moving into Empty Nest Motherhood & perhaps a smattering of Menopause Musings. I am going to just trust that what I am drawn to share will evolve however it's meant to move out of my mind, through my fingers tapping keys into this world. If you actually land here and want to keep following I welcome you and invite you to take a time leap back to the very first post ever as an intro.
oxo
Kerry
