I so admire bloggers who manage to post daily. I once was one of them–although the content was sometimes questionable at best. To have fresh ideas and the ability to shape them efficiently…what a gift!

But so much of what I wrote over the last four years has been about life’s trials: experiencing my Dad’s swift decline and then his death; and my own bizarre tumor adventure in particular.

More recently, I chose not to blog about my Mom’s badly broken leg and how much she struggled with the recovery (she’s beyond healed now and so happy). Or my concussion last summer (although I have tweeted about it plenty). I haven’t posted about trips I have taken or exciting (only to me, probably) developments in my career.

Ultimately I have not posted about how low I have felt. Because who wants to read about that?

[I know that I am not alone and like a lot of you, I give partial claim to the current state of world affairs.]

But the real struggle is with myself. Adulthood is hard. I realize now that my life will forever be divided into the portion With Dad and Without Dad. Losing one of the two people who made me removed whatever blinders I had on. And it isn’t simply about feeling his absence. I feel the passage of time acutely–for all I know, my life is more than half over (and I only recently made it to Paris for the first time!*).

Galeries Lafayette

On my darkest days, I find myself looking at my life and feel absolutely crushed about the things I haven’t accomplished, the places I haven’t seen with my own eyes and my present lack of energy to do something about the ways I feel I have let myself down.

Please know this: I don’t feel like this every day and I acknowledge that I have the power and the privilege to chip away at my to do list. I am fortunate.

On better days, I remind myself that Dad would be so proud of me, and Mom still is. And that I live in one of the best cities in the world and get to visit all kinds of cool places. And most importantly, even when I am alone, I don’t feel lonely because I know there is a lot of love in my life.

I hope to write and post more. We’ll see. In the meantime, I’d love to hear how you’ve been in the comments.

*This is simultaneously tongue-in-cheek and sincere.