Blurred Focus 1/23/2022

By: Jennifer Richardson Holt

Let’s try a bit of an experiment. We shall call it an exercise in transparency.  I am going to be completely honest with all of you. I have no idea what to write about this week. Little tiny snippets of a subject will pop into my mind when I try to come up with something but none of said snippets are seemingly anything about which a train of thought could take to track. So I am just going to start typing away here and we shall see what happens. This could very well be an abject failure and I could sit here staring at this screen and the keyboard with a blinking cursor mocking me for long periods of time.  This is more real of a possibility than I care to admit.  But today I am being brutally honest and just letting you know up front that I am at a loss.  Sure I could ramble on about my daughter, the seasons or even my cat but for the love of all that is good and holy, I think we have milked at those teats pretty aggressively as of late. And because of that here I sit.  If I could type with my fingers crossed I would do so if I thought it would help matters.  Now, we are off an adventure to see what transpires today. I shall be just as surprised as all of you. I am undecided if that is exciting or horrifying.

I would be lying if I did not admit to you there has been a massive passage of time betwixt the previous paragraph and this one. As you can see, though I am starting a new paragraph I have not as of yet, truly said anything.  Pretty sure if you were to peer inside of my brain it would look like someone ripped up hundreds of books, some of photographs of beautiful scenery, some of little known history, some about royalty, almost certainly an unhealthy number of useless trivia books.  Now the pieces of all these volumes is scattered all over the floor of my mind’s chamber.  The pieces are big enough that you can see what is on them and make out the content just enough to pique intrigue but they aren’t big enough nor are they few enough for them to come anywhere close to being pieced together.  Lots of interesting bits to examine but nothing willing to give up all its secrets.  This can’t be good.  Has someone done something to my head?  Was I unknowingly injured?  Did I fall out of the bed one night and my frontal lobe take a blow? In looking around in here, it certainly looks like some unwarranted jarring went on.

If I’m honest, scattered in all directions is probably an appropriate adjective for my mind. Focus has never been my strong suit.  I remember in school, all the way back to the first grade we were to write something called “The Morning News”.  This consisted of possibly 3 or 4 sentences with simple statements about if it were cloudy or sunny and what day of the week it was. I don’t know that I ever finished a single edition of said “News”.  You see, I have the ability to daydream that is downright uncanny. I have heard people speak of being put in a blank room as punishment. They say because you have nothing to look at or do is what makes it so terrible but to me, this would not remotely be an issue. I could stare at a blank wall, let my imagination take over, and while I would of course, prefer a lovely scene it certainly isn’t necessary.  It’s a gift and a curse though.  My ability to take flights of fancy makes it very hard to stay on task, conversation or even thought.  I can try to clean my house, start in one spot, think of something I need, and in going to get said thing see something else and start it. You see where this vicious cycle is going.  My efforts end with about seventeen things started with fervent diligence and if I am lucky, possibly two finished? 

I get so frustrated with myself.  It is amazing how much of its own plan my brain has. Should that be a thing?  I mean the organ that controls everything else about me taking its own initiative to think and fixate on things for which I didn’t remotely have any leanings.  It could be my innate to ability to worry when I really don’t want to. I mean, I worry that I have forgotten something that I should be worrying about. I know it doesn’t accomplish anything but NO. My mind insists.  I mentioned my lack of focus. I won’t even get into my ability to forget something whilst I am attempting to set a reminder to remember it. No, my brain is a rebel without a cause. It doesn’t care what its owner wants of it. If I could take it out and give it some sort of effective punishment to teach it the error of its ways I would. But let’s be honest, if I could do that I’d probably just get so distracted I would forget where I put it and then there would be that lack functioning nervous system issue and I would be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.

So what have we learned today?  We have learned I am terrible at focusing. This blog alone took far too many excessively lengthy pauses for the most asinine of reasons; I won’t bore you with all the details but I did have one long and ridiculous examination of the amount of mistletoe in the bare oak tree outside my window. Good grief.  We also learned today that my brain has an agenda of its own and if I want it to mesh with mine then it is an outright battle for it to do so. That is unless it involves a few topics that we don’t seem to quarrel about like the joy of chocolate or majestic crowns or something of the sort.  We also learned that I do have at least one undeniable skill and that seems to be the ability to ramble for a fair amount about nothing in particular. If I’m honest I already knew that. It served me well writing papers in all my schooling. I’d love to say I will close with something profound. I won’t though.  This was an investigation to see what would happen if I started writing without a topic. All that was proven is that my brain will, yet again, do as it wishes.  Maybe there is someone, anyone, out there that has a similar struggle with a defiant and sometimes almost mutinous mind? I like to hope so. Of course my mind says this is all perfectly fine.  But, it would.