11. The weakest/strongest thing I could be

One concept I've been taking to heart since my writing workshop in July is having a notebook for all the ideas that come to mind or things I observe in my day, as a way of "catching creativity by its tail." I used to do this a long time ago. At one point in college I had a small unlined Moleskine with one-line poems and even a taped-in snowflake I had made out of weigh paper from chem lab. (Molly, I'm currently weighing my options for puns on the word "tare". See what I did there? Elizabeth, I am remembering the many vellum notes and other arch-y gifts I received from you.)

I may have accidentally Konmari'd all my physical notebooks (oops) so I have yet to come up with a happy place to put all my thoughts (plus I love my planner but sometimes feel frustrated with having multiple paper notebooks on my desk). For now I'm gathering thoughts on my phone because I almost always have it on me. (Except when I'm asking "where is my phone?", which happens 2394082343209 times a day. #literally)

Yes I'm an old person who needs the extra-large font.

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I can't remember where I first heard of this concept but it popped into my head again this morning, the notion of "being one's own best friend." I feel like that's not a message I heard growing up but could have really used since, especially when I first moved to the PNW. Even if I had heard it, I probably would have scoffed at that; that's for losers, I'd have thought.

And yet: Liz and Brene (about time I drop those last names, eh?) talk in the aforementioned Episode 12 about how we are quick to offer compassion to others but more hesitant with ourselves, but what makes you so special that you think you don't deserve compassion? (They then go on to talk about the "narcissism of depression." Oof.)

I'm totally that person who always needs at least one best friend and I've been lucky to have many best friends throughout my life.* So it totally depressed me when we moved to a new place that I thought was cool and easy and no one wanted to be friends, period. I hate to consider that this all happened so that I could learn to be my own best friend. (Insert gagging sounds.) It seems simultaneously weak and the strongest thing you could do/be.

So in a way, this project, as it unfolds, is kind of also a "that notebook" with myself. Letters to myself that are evidence someone wants to talk to me, whether or not you readers are here for the ride, which I'm glad that you are.

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*I've also since snagged an extraordinary husband who is now forced to be my best friend for life. (Channeling Ali here. We're already on a first-name basis, after only one previous blog mention.)

P.S. Remember how I mentioned my neo(?)-Ludditism in previous posts? I feel like I fell off the edge of the Internet when Google Reader died. How did the rest of you survive? I still don't think I can recover from that. RIP, GR.