When the books and letters pile up

pile of books and letters

Not that I expect anyone to have noticed, but I haven’t been able to post as much lately due to being ridiculously occupied! From a vacation to a busy job to taking two courses that have homework to watching Orange is the New Black and Orphan Black (heh) to spending time with friends and family to getting food poisoning to getting ready to start a new job to preparing my book, I can hardly keep my eyes straight and focused on anything. I’ve been missing blogging and Instagramming, though, for sure. *Waves sheepishly*

Two things I really miss though and can’t wait to get back to: reading and writing letters.

Over the past couple months, I had a great steady pace of chomping through books like Mrs. Pacman. I’ve stalled and have been getting stuck on a few that haven’t quite excited me yet, so are harder to finish. They keep piling up by my bed after I doze through three pages before falling asleep too late; they will probably fall over on me in my slumber sometime soon, I wouldn’t be surprised! I am looking forward to hopefully having more free time soon to settle into a story again. I get all dreamy eyed thinking about falling into a new world.

Do you ever just let your eyes scroll across your room and pick whatever book they land on?

As for letters, I’ve got a big pile I’ve been slowly getting through. Usually I am the most prompt pen pal, but I’ve had a hard time lately, especially because (well, like reading), it’s hard to multi-task with. In those couple free hours I have every day or so, I can work on assembling letters while watching Netflix no problem, but the actual writing, the paying attention to a letter, takes a lot more concentration. I want to really get into my letters with my pen pals, so it takes time. So when I can’t, I feel guilty and itchy! I miss posting pictures about mail and interacting with the community as much on Instagram, and I yearn to get back to my written conversations.

How do you manage your pile of letters?

Books and letters are things that I love to indulge in privately, say in my room or going to a cafe or park, but I also love indulging while with people. It’s one of my most favourite things to do with my guy, and I hope to have more of it with friends. Last weekend, the only way I could finally get to one letter was to get to the Toronto’s First Post Office for a letter-writing event. Which is why I am so excited to host my own next month! Getting people who love writing letters or even just communication together in person is magical, because for the most part, you exist online or on paper in talking to each other. But we need that human interaction, too.

Anyways. I want to know more about how you guys handle getting those creative vices satisfied while in overwhelming times! Do you set aside an hour every day? Do you plan a chunk of time on the weekend and refuse to budge it? Or do you try to get all your stuff done so you can fall into your hobbies for hours on end?