Writing for so many days in a row is hard. This month of writing has been like a mental Jenga game. I have ideas and experiences in my mind, and I push them a little to see if they move. If they are solid, stuck in the pile, I keep tapping and nudging other ideas until one moves, and I can pull it out.

Then I start to write, and the memories flow and I start to see things differently. I begin to untangle how I feel and what matters to me. There’s a tall tower of stories as we near the end of 31 Days, and I’m still pushing on those blocks. Today, none of them seem loose enough to push out.

There are more stories and experiences I could write about, but today the words aren’t coming, the sentences are clunky and dry. Those stories aren’t ready to be told yet.

This is new. My full nest has occupied so much of my emotional and physical energy for the last 28 years that I never thought to nudge my thoughts and memories to see if they would come out in words on a page.

There were certainly plenty of words throughout those busy years, so much talking and listening and reading. Those were the stories that started stacking up in my mind, to be pulled out later, in no particular order it seems, the blocks in my mental Jenga game.

Some writers can’t help but write; they have stacks and stacks of journals and stories and poems. I have liked writing, and done it when I needed to communicate–emails, Christmas letters–but I never could maintain a journaling habit, or took the time to sit down and write just for the sake of being creative.

What I love about writing is the words themselves, the way the right words in the right order can create an image and communicate an idea in a way the captures a truth or a memory. Any form of them feeds me; I have been content to absorb them in listening and reading, and to share them in talking. Until now.

Maybe it’s because there are fewer people around all the time, less talking, less listening, and the stored up words and stories are starting to come loose. Maybe it’s that I want the stored up words in my head to be written down in case I don’t ever get a chance to tell them; I want to capture them for those who might want to know them.

I’m an observer, a gatherer; I’m not a person of quick, decisive action. I’m comfortable with indecision, always waiting as long as I can to make sure I have all the information. I’m a believer in waiting to see how a situation unfolds.

I’m not great in emergencies, I need time to think before I act. When a crisis arises, I’m the one saying, “Let’s take a step back.” When I say I have to think about something before deciding, I’m not trying to avoid commitment–I really do have to think about it.

In the relative quiet of my half-full nest, I am finally able to take my own advice to step back and evaluate the experiences and stories and words that have made up these beautiful, messy, crazy, fun years as the mom of a large family. I can move to a different perspective and see the connections, the patterns and the threads that run through our lives and tie us together.

Now is the time to write.