I took the day off from work today. Midway through yesterday, I was feeling tired. I was emotionally drained, intellectually drained, just drained. I needed a day where I didn’t have to do anything, where there were no emails to answer or things to schedule. I got up this morning and spent two hours writing. It was good writing and I’ve vowed to myself that I will do this every morning. Despite Bolker’s suggestion that writing 5 pages a day is a better approach than setting a specific time limit, the time limit works better for me. I like knowing there’s an end and I can push myself to the end if need be. Lately, though I’ve been writing anyway, I’ve found writing at the end of the day difficult. My mind is already filled with stuff and my body is tired. I’ll be setting the alarm back a half-hour and slaving away.

After I finished my writing, I told myself I wasn’t obligated to do anything else. And so I didn’t. I played Civilization and Diner Dash. I made a quick trip to the grocery store. I watched What Not to Wear and The Office. Mr. Geeky made me dinner while the kids were down the street eating with friends.

I’ve noticed this pattern in myself. When I get really stressed out and frustrated, mostly in an intellectual way (trying to figure something out or solve a problem or something), I need some serious down time in order to work out the problem. I need to distract my brain from itself. I give it a toy to play with so it won’t worry itself over how to begin chapter one or think things like, “what if I’ve left something out.” My brain is like a small child (maybe I am too).

A day of not thinking, of delivering virtual meals to virtual people and conquering virtual worlds. Escape, sweet escape.