Tag: spacing out

That Glazed Look

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 5 Comments

Not everyone admits to it, but everyone does it.

In meeting rooms, at desks, at parties, or in the privacy of your own living room.

You are in the conversation one moment, skiing down Mt. Fuji the next. Nodding at the other person one moment, nodding towards twilight the next. It’s not the buzzed look, or the intoxicated look, or the sleepy look.

It’s the glazed look.

The staring eye, the blank glance, the frozen look of concentration that comes across your face when you zone out for a brief moment.

Sometimes it’s inevitable. The meeting where the group is talking about something way over your head. The 10th time the person next to you tells the same story to a new pair of ears. Your friend is confiding something to you and their voice turns into bubbles from under water.

Why does this happen?

Your intentions are pure. You really do want to learn something in the conference room. You really do want to understand what someone is telling you. You really are interested in finding out “who-done-it”. But it’s like someone unplugged you for a moment.

Work-wise, I often wonder if I get involved in things above my pay grade. i.e., the outcome affects me, but the planning stages don’t. I’ve found myself so tired that I’ve been at parties with besties and they are telling me something important and it’s all I can do to keep my eyes open. I have sat on my sofa, watching a movie/TV show that I’ve waited forever to see, and have somehow missed the most important part because my mind has been in la la land.

How does this happen?

I have a feeling people smarter than me don’t space out the same way I do. I am surrounded by various levels of genius, and as much as I want to run off and play with them in their playland, I just can’t. I don’t understand the mumbo jumbo. So I imagine I’m in the meeting glazing, they know everything, and have no time to glaze. They probably glaze later when someone talks about Halloween Wars or the Mediterranean Diet.

This is not only on the work front. It’s on the entertainment front, the social front, the political front. I try hard not to get pumped up about anything I can’t change, so when someone else gets pumped up, I give them their space. And my space. And eventually the glaze.

Is it that I just don’t find most of the outside world interesting? Not at all!

I am all for learning and understanding and discovering every day you live and breathe. Maybe I’m finding out that, as I get older, certain spheres of knowledge are beyond my ken, and that I don’t need to understand everything to move forward. I pay attention when it comes to things that directly involve me — how I’m going to accomplish things that boil down to the Internet Data Conversion Analyst Specialist or the writer or the photographer or the friend. I don’t need the cerebral mish mash to do what I’m supposed to do. I am a good friend and a good worker. I take care of those who take care of me, and I do a pretty good job of taking care of myself.

But if one day you’re talking to me and…I…juussstt….

What were we talking about?

 

Blank Brained

~ humoringthegoddess ~ 16 Comments

face-coloring-page-03I feel like I haven’t been here forever. Between escaping for Labor Day Weekend, football drafts, and visiting children, the world has curiously slipped around me.  My fellow bloggers Ittymac (http://ittymac.wordpress.com) and Hugmamma (http://hugmamma.com)  and Coochie Mama (http://andrawatkins.com) and the Philosopher (http://moviewriternyu.wordpress.com)  have fortunately carried on the ways of the world, but I feel I have a lot to catching up to do.

I often talk about my Muse. She’s a feisty Irish lass that pops onto my shoulder at the most inopportune times with ideas and opinions and story lines. So where was she when I was in Wisconsin’s Door County for four days?  DId she go on vacation too? Why is it that often when I find myself with a big chunk of time, all I want to do is sit and listen to the wind blow through the treetops or zone out on TV?

Sitting at a campground. The hubby and family went off to the beach. I stayed behind to watch the dogs. They were tied up, quiet. I was full from a slice of sub, it was peace and quiet. There were even sporadic clouds to break the summer sunlight. I was ready. OK — so there wasn’t a lot of phone signal near the Lake Michigan campground. No problem. And my laptop’s keys were sticking and the computer was slow. And the spiral notebook I put in my bag was a little damp from a bottle that leaked water. Minor setbacks to a woman who has a list of engaging, entertaining, mind blowing things to write.

Yet there I sat. Blank brained. Blank faced. The dogs lazily spread out sleeping, and the sound of distant campers tinking in their tent stakes filled the stillness.  Before I knew it I was either dozing, staring into the woods, or doodling on the page that was supposed to hold my future writing.

Does this happen to you?

Do you get all snuggly and cozy and ready to read a great book and wind up staring at the blurred pages? Do you pull out all your jewelry making stuff and arrange it all and get ready to create something extraordinary and just stare at your beads?  Do you have an idea for a blog, short story, or poem, and when you get to the blank page your mind is blank as well?

Do you have an explanation for this — other than old age?

Tell me your stories. Tell me your solutions.

Now….what was I writing about?