Aug.08 - Blaugust Day 8 - Still sitting with yesterday's events

Eleventy being weird

I went to publish this post, and the URL should be: hollie.eilloh.net/blogs/2025/08/08/

But that didn't work. I made the 08.md file, wrote this post, and then Eleventy didn't serve it up. The file was in SRC (where it originated) but not in Site (where the 08.html should have existed). I made an 09.md as a test, and that one made it to Site just fine. Can Eleventy not handle the 08/08? That seems weird, right? My date structure isn't unusual at all for a blog.

I named it "8th.md" and then it worked. Will ask my team of Eleventy experts later.

Autism

Still in a kind of good-but-wow-still-overwhelming shock over what happened yesterday. I tried to read Unmasking Autism several times, but the resonance of it was too much, and I'm already in burnout, so I just kept backing out and letting myself rest, instead.

That was the big difference today. I let myself rest - at a very different level than what that phrase usually means. I live with a chronic illness, I know how to rest. Or, I thought I did? The energy that masking takes, the basic fact of this, continues to blow me away. No - what really blows me away is simply how much of what I consider me, is actually masking.

When I sit and try to reckon how much energy I've spent on this over the last half century of my life...oh, the feelings.

Today, everything my system wanted, I let it have, and mostly what it wanted was rest. Staring off into space, slowing down so my brain could catch up, and a dozen other things. I didn't fight it at all today. I didn't tell myself to keep going or just try a little harder, I didn't make myself do chores or homework (heh that might bite me in the ass later but let's go with it), instead I listened to what I felt. I felt exhausted and overwhelmed and like I very clearly needed to rest. So I did. It was GREAT.

I had a little more energy than yesterday, too, and it was difficult to imagine this was anything other than literally the energy I was saving through this newly accessible skill level of Resting. Greg repeatedly encouraged me to keep going with this. Jupiter answered a bunch of questions I had. It was a quiet but powerful day.

There are a million questions still. I'm excited to keep learning, and at the same time, aware of how paradigm-shifting all this is, and going as gently as I can. I'm really, really done forcing myself to do things. Everything I'm learning says to stop. Stop all that crap. Getting that permission after so many years of feeling like the world is disappointed in me, is so empowering. And to know there's a whole AuDHD community out there I can get into when I'm ready, is also reassuring.

I watched Contact again tonight. For like the gazillionth time. The scene where Kent notices the second signal - that's how the autism stuff feels. Like it's been there all the time, but just in the background. Now if I could also get a primer, that'd be great.

👨🏼‍🚀

If there's an afterlife, I hope Jim Lovell is walking on the moon right now.