I did it.
It’s done.
Weeks of effort.
Burnout raging at times.
So. Many. Days. Dedicated.
Taking so. Much. Longer. Than expected.
At one point, I think I was more than a month behind, but as of today, the exhausting task has been completed. I’m finally out from underneath the great weight.
I’m free.
I’m completely caught up on my journal writing.
This post makes the ninth published post of the day today and is my first in I don’t even know how long that’s actually published day of.
🤯
🪇🥳🪇
And no hyperbole, I’ve been so focused on this for so long that I’ve felt out of sorts today since I finished. I keep going back to my phone feeling like there must be something I should be doing, but…
I’m done.
There’s no more catch-work hanging over my head.
Wow. 🪇🥳🪇
I was up early, back hurting, I think from the bed. I’ve been sleeping backwards in it for several days now, and it’s not as cushioned where my feet normally go.
But I made the most of it. I replied to a bunch of messages from family and friends about an LDS YouTube video that was quite impactful to me yesterday.
And then I don’t right into my journal catch-up efforts. My goal was to finish 5 entries today and then be fully caught up by end-of-day tomorrow, but for the first time in a good while, it was going faster than I expected, and I was just cranking them out!
When I was down to just yesterday’s entry left, I thought maybe I’d leave it for tonight, but nope, I plowed right on through it, despite it being a longer entry.
And then… done. 😊
So sometime in the afternoon when I’d conquered the mountain, I finally stopped for breakfast. 🙃
Yogurt, muesli, no-longer-frozen mangos. 😋
With my day, and the foreseeable future, suddenly open, I spent some time in the Book of Mormon,
After that, things got a bit more challenging. I tried to veg out a bit, but I’m having trouble staying interested even on things I was recently interested in.
I think something is moving inside of me, and I really hope I wake up and come back from the dead, so to speak. I want so much to have the hope and energy and drive and passion and light and peace and strength that I’ve been missing for most of the last 10 years.
Oh, I hope. 🤞
I texted multiple people today, some people I haven’t connected with in a good little while.
It feels good to be breaking through a bit. 🩵
I tried to lift one new little part of my world today, trying to lift someone who’s been having a rough go.
I hope that person feels lifted. 🤍
It’s funny, just as I complete my big journaling comeback, my blog stats tell me not a single person has read my recent posts. I have two different stats monitors running, and they both agree.
Zip. Zero. Zilch.
So… maybe no one’s reading. 🙃
Or maybe both stat counters are broken.
Or maybe something else.
🤷
I just chilled in my van for a while, eating, and staring at my phone catching up on various kinds of news and whatnot.
Crazy times.
I took some pictures on the beach, and then I headed south along the coast, stopping for some pictures in beautiful spots while listening to gospel-centered YouTube videos.
Really beautiful coastline with an amazing number of available, empty pullouts to just park and stare at the beautiful vistas.
Eventually, I made it over to Moeraki Boulders Beach, a fun little place where a collection of large, spherical septarian concretions have eroded out of the coastal mudstone and settled, sometimes in clusters, on the beach.
They’re pretty cool. Hard exterior, with a partially hollow crystalline interior, almost like ginormous geodes–the biggest being about two meters tall, with a few broken ones scattered along the beach, watch allows you to see what they look like inside.
I snapped pictures, picked up a few pieces of trash I found, and just hung out for a while enjoying the area.
Lots of people.
And I wished people would enjoy but not touch, but invariably, people want to climb all over them to get pictures standing on them.
Hopefully, the boulders survive, in tact, long after we’re all dead. 🙃
After a yucky bathroom experience (I failed to notice the liquid at my feet while using the long drop and plopped my pants right down onto a puddle of… well… wish I could say with confidence it was seawater, but with no other liquid on the bathroom floor except in the danger zone😅, I took those pants off right quick 🙃), I headed south along the coast to my freedom-camping spot at Katiki Beach North Reserve Rest Area, parking in a spot that, while on a tilt, was the only spot left to park and have full view of the beach and ocean below.
My mom alerted me to the fact that one of my entries from way back on January 15th was missing a picture, so I went back and found it was actually missing something like five that hadn’t properly uploaded. So I re-uploaded pictures, and resolved that. Hopefully, that’s the only entry with upload errors. 🤞
Not that anyone will know. 🙃
I hung out veging on the beach, mostly in my van but also walking the beach.
I replaced that blown 10-amp fuse from yesterday. I’d put it in the dome light spot, but that fuse apparently also controls the power door locks. 🙃
Gratefully, I remembered I’d brought some spare fuses with me from the States, so I got that replaced, and more I can use my door locks without having to have my key in the on position. 🙃
Well… that’s pretty much my day!
I’m tired, and I’m pre-migraining, so hopefully I can nip that in the bud. 🤞
But really cool to be able to have real ocean waves as my white noise for the night. ☺️
If anyone is still reading, loves and hugs to you. 🩵
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 