99 Days of Something – #1
Last year I managed a 100 day series of blog posts starting with this one below. 100 Days of Wonder was inspired by having booked tickets to a 100 Years of Wonder Disney on Ice and being 100 days out from our Disney trip. I also had Covid so wasn’t up to doing much and spent a lot of time in my head, watching TV and scrolling through photos. You can read the whole – rather random series by going back through the posts if you wish. I did that yesterday because I wondered about doing something similar again. Yesterday was our 100 days out from our next Disney trip day. This time Disney Paris. I realised I missed the discipline of taking time to reflect and write every day… and then I didn’t actually write anything yesterday.
So, here I am wondering whether it is worth trying again to string a series of blog posts together in a similar way. 99 Days of the discipline of writing, even just a little bit, every day might help keep me focused and might actually help me make progress with some writing projects. What do you need to write well? I have never been one for sitting at a desk. I always had a desk, I rarely sat at one. I am more of a notebook on the sofa, typing away in a coffee shop or lounging somewhere random kind of a girl for writing. But I do spend a lot of time at my desk at home so today I put up some things to make me smile. On the left I framed the packaging from the 3 Disney Coffee bean varieties we bought on our last trip. On the right are 3 postcards I bought in Philadelphia in May. So yeah, my writing and creativity is usually fuelled by Disney, Coffee and the inspirational words of others. Let’s see how this works for the next 99 days.
100 Days of Wonder – #13
The picture is of the Contemporary Resort taken from the ferry that connects the Magic Kingdom to the Ticket and Transportation Centre. It was taken in January 2006 and the now familiar sight of the Bay Lake Tower which would be to the left of the building is missing. I talked about familiarity and it’s importance in previous posts but looking at this photo made me think about it more. It’s not just that our brains need something familiar (my base camp in the 100 acre wood) to go explore (learn from), my brain needs the familiar to focus and also sometimes to recharge. I am actually quite happy at the limits of my comfort zone and I like change and new and different. But I also like familiar. I like it to rest my brain and also to focus. I go to the music I listened to over and over and over when I was younger when I am writing. I like writing in my Mum’s house with its mix of things I remember from being little, some of mine and Kath’s old furniture and some new bits and pieces and as much as I like exploring new places and having adventures, I like going back to the Contemporary. The smell as you walk in, the sounds, the knowing where things are. Familiar doesn’t necessarily mean ‘the same as it was’. It’s more about how a place, music, book or whatever makes me feel. I don’t mind Bay Lake Tower now being there, I don’t mind there being new things to discover every time we go. It doesn’t make it any less familiar. I think maybe it’s about not having to think too much about things and just feeling at home in a space or moment.
100 Days of Wonder – #9
As I recover from Covid and try and pick up my training for the 2025 Dopey Challenge again, I am reflecting on running and what it has taught me, what it means to me and where I am with it now. There’s lots more about my running on my running blog including a write up of this particular run. I loved this run. That’s rare. I am still not entirely convinced I actually like running. But it means a lot to me because it has taught me a lot about myself. I have always been pretty good at everything I do but that’s simply because I just don’t do things I am not good at. Running is the exception. Running has taught me to stick at something, that doing something just because is a good enough reason to do it, that not being good at it doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy it. I am more patient with myself and others because of running, I struggle less with the inevitable failures of academia because running taught me I don’t have to excel at everything and it’s ok to have a bad run (a classic reviewer 2, a not perfect teaching session, a not so great meeting). I have (mostly) let go of the competitive streak in me because the world didn’t end when I came last in a race. Running has also taught me to celebrate and ‘bank’ the wins, the glorious runs – like this 5k – where everything feels right, the sense of achievement when you cross a finish line, run a new distance, go faster than you ever have or have recently or the wonder of kingfishers, herons, kites, deer and all sorts of other wildlife you stumble across on early morning trails. I try and note and enjoy the joyful teaching moments, the ‘your paper has now been accepted’ emails, the invites to go talk to interesting people about cool stuff because there will always be another long ploddy run in the cold rain and its academic equivalents – they need doing, they help make the magic happen but having a memory bank of of what the magic feels like definitely helps!
My Conversations 