January tried to take me down

Just let me dust off my keyboard real quick.

I started a project before the holidays. My calculations said that I would be done well before the holidays hit. That didn't happen. Before I knew it I was juggling both.

Why can't the holidays be more spread out? Every month is a holiday! I use to think it was a nice distraction from the gloom of winter, but that only works til January 1'st.

After the holidays, hence January 1'st, you're back to every day routine. You notice the cold more. You know you are looking at, in the least, three months of bare trees, gray skies, achy bones, horrific allergies, and cold. If anything is causing you stress, it will be doubled, maybe even tripled, during the month of January.

I was exhausted by the time Christmas was over. The week between Christmas and New Years, not much of anything got done, which unfortunately gave me more time to catch up on social media, because, you know, January ain't hard enough.

My faith in humanity plummeted.

Maybe if I would have stayed away from the comment sections...

January was a loss. I was physically and mentally exhausted. I trudged through the things that had to be done and put off anything else that could wait. January was taking me down.

Then I remembered something I had read a long time ago, that what we feed our brains can have a profound effect on us. How I felt was a perfect example of that. I started cleaning up my social feed and e-mail. I had been meaning to do that anyway and kept putting it off. I knew it was going to be time consuming since it hadn't been done since my youngest was a baby. She's nine now.

It took a little while, but I started feeling better. There's so much wrong in this world, but there is so much good still too. There has to be a balance to what we fill our minds with. All negative, all the time, every day, will take it's toll.

It also helped that this year has been oddly warm. People are out doing yard work that usually isn't done until spring. Our temperatures are matching those from the warmer states. Some days we have even been warmer. Although possibly not a good thing, it's sure making this winter more bearable for everyone.

The thing about that, though. I have a lot to catch up on. I ain't even done with that project I was working on. I was supposed to have at least three more months before any outdoor stuff happened. That's one good thing about winter, there's hardly any outdoor work. But even so, I kinda like skipping winter this year.

I want to cook out here in the next few days. That way I can say I barbecued in February. In Ohio!

I know. It don't take much with me.

It's the small things, though.