For a while, I have found myself in a writing slump. Rather than a lack of material, this slump comes from both an inability caused by time constraints and a reluctant unwillingness to devote the effort needed to write well about the thoughts constantly jostling for attention in my brain.

My work days fill with the numerous, often heavy, cares of the education field including everything from trauma induced by the pandemic and the often callous response of political leaders of the district and state to learning how to care for students who come to me with gender identity struggles as well as the mundane tasks like remembering to enter grades.

In the hours before and after work, I strive to balance everything else: eating and preparing meals, marathon training, tutoring one of my former students, eeking out a short journal entry and perhaps getting in some reading. Consistently, I struggle to balance all of this with the added burdens from the swirling morass of current events all around.

I have writing in my to do list as something to do every day. I know that it helps me process the jumble in my brain. Yet, as an introvert who spends the day performing extrovert activities, I enter the evening with negligible desire, energy, or time to start writing entries that deserve research and uninterrupted thought flow rather than piecemeal here and there.

I don’t know if or when this will change. I hope that it will be soon but it may not come quickly and I need to be okay with that.