I don't remember when exactly it was that I stumbled across Sundry/Linda's blog. I was young, it was Diaryland, there were no kids (in her life or mine). I kind-of halfheartedly would read her back in those early days, more intrested in the fact that HA! Look! Someone on the internets talks about places I've been and could drive to, right this very moment! I lost track somewhere along the way and stopped reading on a regular basis.
When she moved to sundrymourning.com, some other blogger I was reading at the time linked to her there, and I...I just fell in love, as weird and stalker-y as that is to say. Riley, her son, was just a few months old, and she was writing about her experiences as a mother with such honesty and such a clear, unapologetic voice (and she was FUNNY!). Reading her felt like sitting down to coffee with my best friend; she talked like me, had the same cynical outlook on life, but she was still a little soft around the edges. I hooked her up to whatever feed reader I was using prior to Google's, and have DEVOURED every word she has written since.
Her life, and naturally, her writing (the content, not the make-you-spit-take-at-work style) has changed a lot since I became a die-hard lurker (I can never get up the nerve to comment all that often...as if I'm not cool enough to speak to her, or something). She has two kids now (both equally adorable), she's a lot more internet-famous...she's matured as a brand, really, and as a mom. Then came some big changes after she had her second son, and it took me awhile to appreciate the awesomeness of it all. Linda used to write about feeling flabby, about oreos and cheetos and all those piehole-comforting foods, and about laying around the house--JUST LIKE ME--and I identified with it and I loved it. And then, it was like one day she just decided she was tired of it all, and started working out. And then she started looking awesome, and talking about how great it all felt, and then her posts started to get more fitness-centric and she even spawned a fitness blog, and then she was training for a triathlon, and I just wanted it all to STOP. I'd get so excited to see that (1) next to All & Sundry in my feed reader, and then goddammit all if it wasn't another fitness post that was making me feel like SHIT about my ever expanding waistline. I got to where I wouldn't even read the fitness posts, I'd just skim right on through until I hit the cute kid pictures.
And then she posted this.
Something about that post struck a chord with me, and not just about fitness. There was this deeper message there, about setting your mind to a goal, digging in and accomplishing it, no matter how goddamn lazy or intimated you're feeling about it. She takes RISKS man, some really awesome risks, and they seem to be paying themselves off.
Something about seeing how far she's come, just on her own willpower, made me realize: I used to be like that...I can be like that again. I can go off, chasing goals and damn it all, achieving them. I can blog every day (or at least more than I have been). I can get in shape. I can finish this never-ending thesis. I can go out and snatch a career I want. Hell, I can even tidy up my house more than once a week. I just have to add it to the plates...and keep spinning.
