I'm happy lately, have I mentioned? I think I've figured out part of what drove me so nuts last fall. It wasn't just that I was busy; I'm always busy. But I was so busy that every day had become tightly scheduled from getting up to falling asleep, and the only times I stopped going was when I just couldn't go anymore, and then I numbed out with dumb tv and felt guilty that I wasn't working.
Whereas now I can take an hour or two to wander around doing entirely non-essential errands, enjoying the music pouring out of my car speakers, singing along at top volume with the window down on an unseasonably warm Chicago day. Taking pleasure in a sudden startled flight of black birds leaping off the traffic light wires, wings dark and swift against a clear blue city sky.
No wonder that last draft wasn't as poetic as it should have been. The part of my brain that wrote poetry had completely shut down. I hadn't left it room to breathe.