I stuck to my plan

and went back to work on Monday even though the thing with Alaina happened and I'm still splashing / flailing around in the grief pool. In fact it did re-open things with my mom so it's like twin griefs each hauling downward on an ankle.

My work right now consists of writing, revision (of poems and the full-length MS), going to readings and reading at open mic so I can hopefully get offered gigs, submitting to one journal per workday, sending the MS to two presses a month, and putting together a chapbook.

I'm thinking of doing a second chap because it could be awhile before the full-length MS is taken and I need a self-esteem booster. Somehow I feel it is easier to do a chap now that I have done one successfully. That could be a load of crap.

I'm investigating micropresses. I find the concept and the aesthetic highly appealing.

This work takes between 3-4 hours per day.

I do a LOT of research on the journal and sitting with poems before I decide what to send. The decision of what to send ends up being more intuitive and less scholarly, for me. This feels right.

I'm still going to group. The discharge date has been pushed back a little. Basically I'm trying to get comfortable with the fact that there is not a date, and that I don't have to be well, rather, improved, before I go.

This work involves a lot of solitude and rejection, which I knew before I accepted it. However, I wish I could shed more grief before getting back to it. I came to the realization, though, that it's probably better to get back to it AND be going to group, so that I can process any issues that come up.

Part of me thinks that I'm blocking feelings by going to work. But doesn't everyone block feelings by going to work? Isn't that called "keeping busy?"

Mike tells me to not overdo it.

The fact that I can work, after many many months of simply not having the energy / concentration level, is such a relief to me that it is almost intoxicating. Well, yesterday it was. Today it just feels like work.