It's So Dusty in Here

Hello, Little Blog, it has been a long time hasn't it? I haven't completely forgotten about you despite the evidence to the contrary. Many are the times I think, "I should blog about that," but of course, I don't. Time is an issue. Honestly, when do people have time to work, keep house, Tweet, text, Facebook, parent, blog, etc., etc.? How do they do all of those things and not let something slide? But there's the rub. Something does slide and it's usually not the computery, techno stuff. It's usually the boring, but necessary stuff like housework. At any rate that has been my personal experience. So, though I would love to sit all day and write, write, write, doing so would not get my house clean, my kids disciplined, my dinner cooked and so forth.

But, Little Blog, I will try to visit you occasionally, just to exercise my writing muscles. I may only come once in a blue moon, but that's just because I have a life to live. Don't take it too personally.

Writer's Block--I Has It; Lots of Time--I Has it Not

Dad, you asked me if I'd given up blogging because I hadn't posted in a while. Well, not exactly, but here are my thoughts lately on that subject:

Not being able to sit down daily and dash off witty, thought-provoking blog posts without a lot of effort is a great source of frustration for me. To be honest, I read very few mommy blogs who post daily that accomplish that feat so I console myself with the fact that it must be a rare mommy blogger who can actually accomplish daily posting with style. I say mommy blogger specifically because I'm not concerned with comparing myself to those who professionally blog or make their living blogging or writing daily in some other venue.

I've come to the conclusion that I couldn't be a professional writer, at least not at this point in my life, because writing, for me, takes an enormous amount of effort and brain power. That last statement makes me sound like a dunce which I don't think I am, but neither am I a genius. The problem is that everybody and their brother/sister/mother seems to think they can write and have something worthwhile to relate. I fear falling into that category--coming across as if what I'm writing is so interesting that it needs to be published on a blog, but in reality it is only mediocre at best. I fear mediocrity; therefore, I don't often post because when I actually sit down to post something, the spark of genius that my thought seemed to be in my head, somehow dies when I try to capture it in words. That's one reason very few people know about this blog of mine. Plus, blogging takes time. To post even mediocrity on a daily basis takes time. I'm only taking time now because I'm too sick to do anything but sit here and think about all the posts I haven't had the time to write, but probably wouldn't even if I did have time because apparently I'm paralyzed by my fear of mediocrity. Sounds like I have some issues with perfectionist tendencies and/or pride.

I suppose if I were more disciplined I could get up earlier and have the quiet, morning hours before my family awoke to ponder my deep thoughts and write blog posts. Of course, I don't think all posts should be deep, but I'm just not very good at being funny although I'm pretty good at being shallow. In a former blog of mine I tried to post daily. I will say that doing so seemed to keep my writing sharper, at least in my own estimation of it, but it kept me up very late and other aspects of my life suffered. When something like blogging, or any hobby for that matter, interfers with keeping up with my housework or interacting with my family then it takes too much time. Yet, I feel taking time to express oneself creatively whether via blogging, scrapbooking, photography, journaling, etc., etc., is an important part of feeding one's creativity--you know, hyacinths for the soul and all that. And, therein lies the sticking point. Any creative endeavor worth doing is worth doing well. We are created in the image of a creative God. Yet, to do something well takes time, sometimes a lot of time. Balance is the key, of course. Balance is something I'm not good at achieving. But I also think balancing one's priorities also means knowing what is most important right now. Right now, writing daily on my blog isn't a high priority. Ideas for blog posts seem to be crowded out by ideas for homeschooling or ideas for our next read-aloud. I'm not going to look back in twenty years and wish I'd blogged more. I will regret any time taken away from my priorities right now--my family. Balance for me means putting aside some of my creative projects so that I can focus on my ultimate creative projects--my kids. Yet, that doesn't have to mean neglecting the feeding of one's soul. I still read. In fact, I probably read more now than I have in a long time. I crochet which I enjoy a lot except when I'm inundated by request to make tons of little crocheted octopi as I have been lately.

Maybe one of these days I'll achieve enough balance to be able to blog daily, read daily, read aloud daily to my kids, perfect my cooking skills, write poetry, read poetry, homeschool, exercise, keep up with the housework, and everything else I would like to accomplish in my lifetime.

Oops!

My dad has pointed out my egregious spelling error in my last post. Thanks Dad. Really. I want to know when I've made a mistake especially a spelling one. I try to proofread several times before hitting the publish button but sometimes mistakes still escape me. I inadvertently used "here" when I should have used the word "hear." I started to go back and just make the correction in the post itself, but seeing as the post has been up for a day already, I decided to just post this retraction.

Reflections on the Title of my Blog

I toyed with renaming my new blog. Then my dad pointed out that one's thoughts and musings are much like little matryoshkas, nested one inside another. How true, I thought. You "open" one thought to explore it, another presents itself. You "open" that thought and then another one is there perhaps a bit smaller and more focused. Eventually you get to a sharply focused thought, and think "Aha! Revolutionary! Why did I not see it this clearly before?!"

But then! Then, when you finally sit down at the computer to blog about your revolutionary, insightful thought, it vanishes inside the bigger and bigger thoughts until that small, focused, beautiful thought is hidden; and then, much like the littlest matryoshka hidden inside all of the bigger ones, the details of your eureka moment become vague in your memory.

But it IS still there waiting for you to open it up again when you aren't sitting in front of the computer. Strange how the computer does that to a thought. But perhaps then, upon revisiting it, the details will etch themselves in your memory a little more until eventually you can paint a lovely word picture of your thought without having to "see" it because you will come to "feel" it instead.

So, I decided to stick with my blog name.

Raison d'Etre: Part 2

I had another blog.

I liked it. It had a name and a header picture that I thought was rather awesome.

But something happened with that blog. I can't put my finger on when exactly it happened. Eventually that blog became like quicksand with me caught in it. I didn't feel that I could effectively redirect my blog in a way that would satisfy me so I ended it.

When I first made the decision to stop blogging, I thought I would stop blogging altogether and simply be content to read and comment on others' blogs.

Silly me! What WAS I thinking? It was not enough to simply read and offer up a comment every now and then. It seemed that more than ever, as I would putter through my day, I would be struck with some thought or tidbit of inspiration and think, "I should blog about that!" Then, "Oh, yeah, that's right. I'm not blogging anymore."

That's when I would realize that I missed blogging.

So I began blogging again, but instead of just taking up my old blog where I left off, I decided to do things the hard way and start over.

But this time, I'm staying true to my bloggy self.