Happy Sunday Folks! Today is the last day of my three day weekend following an extremely busy and protracted set of days working (9 in a row!) and having woken up this morning and helped myself to a cup of coffee I’m only just feeling myself again. I was exhausted. The joy of shift patterns, ey?!
The last couple of weeks sped around me in a blur. Between protracted shifts and little sleep, finding the time to write has been really challenging. This is why I was extremely elated when I discovered that one of my articles from late last year about the importance of setting boundaries was picked up by a member of Medium’s staff and republished in their official, featured, “Relationships” magazine!
In official “Medium Speak” this is known as “curation”. It’s something that I never expected to happen to one of my pieces of writing and something that occurred quite by accident indeed! I wish I were able to now write a whole piece about “how to get your articles curated on Medium.com” but I haven’t figured out myself exactly how it happened.
Never the less, this was one of my really personal pieces that I poured my heart and soul into, so I’m extremely grateful that it was selected.
The irony of course, is that this piece was curated on Valentine’s Day! Yikes! I hope it didn’t ruin anybody’s dates!
Speaking of Valentine’s Day…
Every year my partner and I shared Valentine’s Day together and for us it became something of a tradition, something quite special. I would always take her our for a nice dinner, dressed up, then mandatory cocktails and skyline views for desert.
This year was different. Despite living together, the pandemic kept us apart.
Being in the emergency services the possibility of missing important dates because of work is always there. It’s something that my partner understands and appreciates, I know, but that doesn’t make it any less difficult when it happens.
Against the backdrop of missing Valentine’s day, due to the pandemic it wasn’t even like she could take herself anywhere else for the evening. No friends or family allowed! It sucked for her, big time.
I left for work early on the 14th and I didn’t get back until late that night. I know she missed me all day and I missed her too, it felt weird not being home.
But thankfully when I got home, we managed to get through a bottle of wine and have a laugh.
It’s these sorts of things that remind me, when all is said and done- it’s the substance that matters. Not the form.
On a final note, I finally passed the 20 follower mark here on this blog and hit the 50 likes achievement too!
And I just wanted to say a HUGE and MASSIVE thank you to each and every one of you for it! It means the world to me, it really does. It meant so much in fact, that I made these cheesy little video clips to celebrate the achievements and posted them on my instagram! Whilst I can’t upload videos (yet) on this blog, check them out on my Instagram @Painting_1000_words!
If you’ve made it this far down the page, thanks for stopping by and thank you again for your support. I’m currently working on a big article which I hope to publish in another magazine on Medium.com soon, so watch this space!
Down below are some links to my most recent posts and some featured articles, check them out and let me know what you think! To get more personal and day to day bits and bobs from, *coughs dramatically* your’s truly, follow me on Instagram here! I’ve been thinking of making a twitter, is it worth it? Let me know in the comments below…
Watch this space!
All the best for the week ahead everybody, stay safe out there!
-Mike.
Painting a Thousand Words 