Sometimes it takes a pity party to reboot your life.

In the last month or so, the following things have happened to me, and they resulted in my spending a lot of solitary and moody time on the couch reading and watching movies and television.

• My son told me that I was never going to get anywhere with my blog if I didn’t focus my topic. He’s a social media expert, so I imagine he is probably correct.
• My physical therapist told me that my knee probably isn’t going to get much better and that I’m going to have limitations with my range of motion in my surgical knee no matter how much I exercise it.
• I realized that wearing a Fitbit has positive and negative aspects. On one hand, I love the documentation of one’s life because I’m a born and bred social historian. On the other hand, the Fitbit also hands up my failures on a social media platform for me and my Fitbit friends to see.
• I blew up at a party when a friend made a political “joke” that hit a nerve.
• A dear friend told me that I have to get off social media and stop worrying about what other people think – including the comments sections of political posts on Facebook. I encounter so much hatred and ignorance that it makes me frustrated, and resulted in my rude behavior on Easter.
• I missed seeing two annual flower shows that I love because I really didn’t have anyone to go with. My friends are all busy and interesting people with their own lives and it’s very hard to schedule activities together. Having active lives should be a good thing, but not if I have to wait to do something because we can’t schedule a time.
• I read three books with bloggers as the primary characters. They were well written and the authors clearly had knowledge of the blogging world, but it made me look at blogging success through different eyes.

So, I’m declaring the pity party to be over, and this is what I’m doing to change my perspective.

I am realizing that I am a diarist when it comes to writing. I like to write about daily life and I’ll never be a person who has a laser focus on just one thing. And I like to take photographs of the things that interest me. I also like the fact that I’m multi-faceted; I think it makes me a more interesting person. I’m not concerned about blogging sponsorship and I certainly never had any intention of being Pioneer Woman when I started blogging. (And just so we’re clear, even Ree writes about something other than food relatively often.)

I am committing to exercising sixty minutes at least five days a week to keep my body strong and my knee as flexible as possible. The Fitbit should be my friend and not my enemy, so I changed the screen to report only the data that will motivate me. I’m looking for new places to explore on my walks, but will continue my twice-weekly water aerobics, which is kinda like therapy for me. My sturdy German girl muscles love to be challenged!

I’m not going to wait any longer for friends to find time in their schedules to go on an outing with me. I love museums, beautiful gardens, home décor stores and second-hand junking. If no one has time to do these with me, I will go myself. It’s not their fault for being busy; it’s mine for not doing what I want to do. There’s nothing the matter with enjoying an activity alone and it’s certainly better than never going because I’m waiting for someone else. There’s a reason why there are maxims about not waiting until tomorrow. Truly, I’m at that age where tomorrow has an age limit. It’s sad, but it’s a fact.

It’s time to put on my yoga pants and walking shoes and get out there. I might even stop at Home Goods on the way home.