Just a small town girl, livin’ in a lonely world where Don’t Stop Believin’ is the only Journey song most people know. If this describes you, please listen to more Journey, and NOT just Wheel in the Sky–that’s easily their second most overrated song. I’m talking about the really good stuff. Sure, I like Lights. Separate Ways (Worlds Apart), you’re getting there. But I’m telling you, the first time I heard Feelin’ That Way transition into Anytime on the Infinity album, it changed my life. For your listening (and viewing) pleasure (trust me–watch at least a little bit of it, because hair.)
Anyway, I’m Kim. I guess I’m not really a small town girl, but I feel like one–I grew up on a small family farm, just outside one of the bigger “cities” in Iowa. I moved to a couple different parts of Iowa for a few years, but eventually I found my way back. Now I’m married to a lovable, bearded fella and live 2.6 miles away from the farm I grew up on. I first started this blog in 2018 when I had just quit teaching full time and started a delightful part-time job at my local public library. I posted close to weekly for a few months, but eventually stopped for a variety of reasons.
Then, in December of 2020, after the weirdest year of most of our lives thus far (thanks, pandemic), I committed to writing something for at least 15 minutes every single day AND I committed to publishing a blog post every week. Then, as I tend to do, I decided to change jobs. I got a job as a school librarian and started working on my Master’s in Library and Information Science. I kept up the daily writing and weekly posting for almost two years and then I just stopped. I was in the middle of getting my master’s and the overwhelm caught up with me. Something had to give, and this ended up being what gave, so I didn’t write much for a couple of years. I finished my master’s in August of 2023, and took some time off of working towards other goals to recover from burnout. I’ve been feeling the itch to start working towards something again lately, though, so I started a booth at my local farmers market (kind of on a whim) where I sell homemade bread and magnets/pinback buttons, and I’m committed to this venture through October 2025. What else I’m going to work towards, exactly, I’m not sure, but writing helps me process what I’m thinking and feeling, so this blog may be where I’ll start figuring it out. I’ll probably document parts of creating a small business, reflect on what works and what doesn’t, and I like finding lessons in everyday happenings, so I’ll share those too.
My ultimate dream is to combine a bunch of my interests and build a huge greenhouse in which I could grow and sell plants and produce, treat some of it like an enclosed park area where people could gather and maybe even bring their dogs for exercise in the winter, host workshops or retreats there on everything from yoga and meditation and baking sourdough bread to growing plants and self improvement and writing. And there would probably be a bakery/cafe attached too. And I want to help people along the way. Have I mentioned I have a lot of interests?
I’ll end this section with a different “Don’t Stop” song from roughly the same era as the other one I mentioned. I’ve adopted this one as my theme song for the last several years, though probably not exactly in the spirit in which it was certainly written since my life is a bit tamer than Freddie Mercury’s was. Still, don’t stop me now–I’m having a ball!
growingmoxie.com 