Manifesting Gratitude (and Procrastination)

Hi. My name’s Candi, and this is my blog. I’m old school. No video blogs for me, thank you very much. (Which, by the way, has gotten way more complicated since 2005 when I launched my very first blog: candik.com. RIP to that neon-fonted, glitter-gif masterpiece.) It’s kind of wild to be blogging again. It feels different now than it did back in the candik.com days. When writing meant pouring your heart out at 1 a.m., maybe slapping on a mood status, and hoping someone left a comment that wasn’t spam.

But here we are again. And today, I felt moved to write about something that's been bouncing around in my head lately: the universe. Manifesting. Raising your vibration. I’m hovering somewhere between grounded realist and woo-curious, teetering on the edge of hippy-dippy… but not all the way in. Yet.

In spite of my refusal to participate in video content, I do still fall into the occasional black hole of doomscrolling. Like right now, when I really should be working on the seven assignments due tomorrow for my Italian class. Ciao, productivity!

Anyone who knows me knows I’m an avid reader. I always have a book with me, ready for those stolen moments when I can sneak in a page or two. Not the “deeply intellectual, challenges-my-worldview” kind of reader, although, to be fair, I did recently read Plato’s Republic and Machiavelli’s The Prince. But in general, I’m more of an escapism reader. I love a good story that whisks me away: to another city, another world, another time. My real life didn’t exactly unfold the way I once imagined, but the books I read let me slip into lives I didn’t live, or maybe wish I had.

Anyway, I digress. (Honestly, that should probably be the actual title of this blog.)

The real point of today’s post was to talk about the amazing authors I’ve discovered during my social media spirals. One writes children’s books about a family of penguins where the parents are two amazing dads. It's called the Pengrooms. Definitely check it out. It's written by an adorable author who has an amazing IG documenting his life with a rare illness that is sadly taking his eyesight. His husband constantly pulls funny pranks on him, seeing as you know, he's going blind. But not in a sad, mean way. It is hilarious, real, and an absolute testimony to what love should look like. Another author who popped up randomly in my feed used to be a middle school teacher and turned his classroom stories into a heartfelt book of short stories. His other books are geared toward kids, which I'm on the lookout for these days while I try to influence my own child to be a little avid reader as well. These are authors I never would have found without the internet, and honestly, I’m weirdly grateful for that.

(Insert dial-up sound effect here)

Maybe it’s the algorithm. Maybe it’s the caffeine. Or maybe it’s just the universe throwing content at me because it remembers I used to do this kind of thing regularly... back in the candik.com days.

So yeah, I guess this is me practicing gratitude. For all the doomscrolling, distractions, and digital noise, sometimes there’s still beauty in the scroll. Sometimes you find a penguin story. Sometimes you rediscover yourself. And sometimes… You just procrastinate on your Italian homework and order a new stack of books instead.

Thanks for reading.Grazie per aver letto! ✨