Writing as a Daily Chore

I started 2021 with a daily prompt challenge: write a haiku per day. And so I did. I followed a challenge set by the site #NaHaiWriMo in which they posted a word or phrase each day as inspiration for haiku. The site continues to offer a daily word still. I not only wrote 365 haiku, I used the word or phrase offered each day within the poem. Yes...so even when the prompt was a song title, I found a way. It was not always easy, in fact, it became some days as a chore I wanted to skip. I had taken myself to a cabin in the early days of 2021 with the intention to write more. As ritual, as habit, as chore...it didn't matter how it made its presence in my life, I wanted a writing practice back in one form or another. The daily prompt made that possible. Though surprisingly, like most habitual things we begin to take for granted after they exist as routine within our days, the poem-a-day almost went unnoticed to me. People would ask: "Are you writing these days?" and my initial response would be, "Gosh, no. I haven't had a writing practice in years but for an intentional facebook post or letter once in a while." And then, almost as an afterthought..."Well, actually, I have been writing a poem-a-day. Haiku." And then a conversation around this almost left-alone-aside would form and I would hear myself saying something like this:

Writing a haiku per day for a year made me notice the words I see and hear around me. I became a word-detective, looking up words and their meaning, origin, use. I walked through my days knowing I had to write a poem about something by the end of each, so I became a better listener, a connector of things. I found myself counting syllables. I became adept at using my "Notes" app on my phone because if I had tried to put these poems into a notebook the experiment would have failed, I had to connect the act to something efficient, always with me, and easily accomplished with minimal effort. This is but a small list of how these days of writing and sticking diligently with a new practice changed my life. And when 12/31/2021 rolled around to 1/1/2022 in a night of revelry, too-much, and just enough of the best of the best sort of everything in life...I wasn't sure I would continue.

So I did.

The year is yet a baby thing.

And now I am someone who writes a poem-a-day (not always a haiku anymore, though they are habitually included in the mix still.)

Changed and altered in the best way.

Ask me how writing has been going lately, I have a lot to say about it.

Look for a new collection of poems...someday soon.