Why I can't complete the Month of Poetry challenge

As you can probably tell from the void where this week's posts should be, I've fallen off the Month of Poetry wagon quite badly.

The flooding has gone from mildly inconvenient to disastrous to catastrophic, and it's only now beginning to dawn on me how long the clean up will take, and how much it will cost. And how much work it will be.

I had big plans for this year. It was going to be a year of easing back on the throttle at work and concentrating on my writing, my health and my social life. It was going to be a year for building on what I've already achieved and taking it in amazing new directions.

It's now looking like a year for surviving, rather than flourishing; for recovering and regrouping rather than forging new paths.

This year has already thrown monstrous challenges at us, and for many the hardest part is just coming, or is still to come - going through ruined belongings, homes and businesses, mourning the terrible losses, deciding what to replace and what to walk away from and start again.

I don't like describing myself as a journalist, because it doesn't adequately cover what I really do. It's why I usually describe myself as a "storyteller" - yes it's flippant, but I also think it's closer to the truth than "journalist" with all the things, good and bad, that implies. I tell stories, and I help others tell their own.

There are many stories which need to be told now. Important stories. Stories of survivial, stories of loss, stories of hopelessness and stories of hope. I may not be much use as part of the physical clean up effort - with my motor skills problems I'd be more likely to injure myself than be any actual help - but where I can help is making sure those stories are told.

Any artificial responsibilities I've taken on, like craft swapping and the Month of Poetry, will have to slide. I have to scale down and possibly abandon my own plans for this year, because the universe obviously has other ideas and has thrown other responsibilities at me.