To Blog or Not To Blog

The first post I ever wrote was about a day when I left two of my children unattended in my car on a snow shit day to retrieve my other child and her friend from school and returned to find the car about six feet from where I left it. It had slid down the crappy parking lot hill sideways (where it was parked illegally) with the kids still inside. I wrote a gripey, pissed off email to some friends about it, though I really don't know why because I had never done that before. I was mostly writing letters to the editor and press releases and the occasional ACTUAL PUBLISHED article at the time and truth be told, I really didn't even know what a blog was. The Kid sent me a link to an article about (wha?) mom bloggers, said I should do that too, and because I rarely shy away from a challenge, I did. Cut and pasted. Hit publish. Freaked out.

I told no one. Not. One. Person. After a couple weeks, I finally 'fessed to about a dozen people and I was pretty content to leave it at that. About six months later, I let it slip into some Christmas cards I had written. I was pretty sure no one read any of it anyway (and subsequently, I was kinda hoping someone would), so I figured what the fuck.

Six some odd months later, a handful of pretty awesome broads starting showing up. Then some dudes. All of 'em blogger people like me, all of them funny, and I learned a lot. I learned how a real garden works and how to gracefully handle death, but mostly I found a wide swath of well-written strangers who though not necessarily like-minded were all equally open and seemingly truthful and engaged in trying to make meaning and fun out of what could be considered mundane. The details matter, after all, and lots of these people write about the details with complete, hilarious perfection.

(I read something written by CS Lewis (not in a book, duh, in a catalog, where it was sewn onto a pillow): “friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, 'What! You too? I thought I was the only one" and lately, this has mattered to me more than any pillow ever should.)

I started writing more. It got easier. I used to hear a good sentence and think about that for a week; now, I hear whole paragraphs and write them down in a day. And it's good because that was the point of this whole experiment to begin with. It's also good because I like the tap tap on the keyboard. I always have, even when it was pen on paper, which makes more of scratchy and then slivery noise if you care, but whatever.

Anyhoo, here's the thing: I think I have some local lurkers.

Maybe even PTO parents. Maybe people from soccer. Maybe... well, who knows who they are or how they got here, but I think they are here. And that brings me right back to Post #1: hit publish... freak out.

There are words I rarely say in my everyday life (like "holla" and "yo") and words I say all the time (like "dude" and "fuck") yet I use all of them here without mercy. There are things I write about my kids and The Kid and me that I wouldn't dare bother saying out loud to anyone in actual public, but sometimes I worry that I am repeating some sorry old story to someone who's already read it before. Which has happened. Which is weird.

And truth be told, there are times I literally hold one hand back from the publish button, sit and stew for a while, worrying about eyeballs and whose eyeballs and fuck! I could make myself crazy and truth be told, I'm kind of doing that right now. Which is all kinds of ridiculous and maybe even narcissistic and why should I care anyway because when I go on Oprah with all my bloggy friends after we streak through the next Blogher conference (really: please click on that link, because that's some funny shit by Jen W via CarolynOnline) ... well, what else left is there to hide?

Still, STILL, I gotta grow some balls or something because the local lurkers are kinda worrying me. (This is the part where the local lurkers might get all bummed out -- which is NOT THE POINT -- because we really should be worrying about me right now, shouldn't we? So, anyway...)

**** RELEVANT INTERLUDE****

This very nice woman who Drinks and Cusses (she had me at "drinks" and "cusses") threw a kick ass salutation my way -- because apparently I KICK ASS, (yo) (see sidebar if you want and also your comment box, because that's where I gotta throw down the accolade, once I figure out how to). She also invited me all bloggy style to write about seven things no one knows about me.

I am hoping that this post gives me the pass I need on that one, because right about now, I am thinking I might be kicked out of the Small Town (what with all the drinking and cussing) (and trash talk) (and less than stellar parenting) and anyway she wrote two things that could just about sum up my seven:

"3. On people: I don't understand people who are brag-a-docious. And I don't trust people who don't drink, or don't like me.

5. I had always felt that I could get away with smartass humor like a guy, but at this point in the late spring (or early Fall?) of my life, I've realized that, in fact, I cannot. It pisses me off that they can be taken for themselves and women are judged strictly on appearance and first impressions. That's why i like it HERE."

See? She also wears straw hats. Nice.

**** END RELEVANT INTERLUDE ****

Lest you think I am pondering a path of untruthiness, I am not. It's been raining for pretty much ever in New England and I dare anyone not to get all down and wishy washy during a deluge. Bear with me my introspection, my wistful, my whine.

I once read this (from an actual book; Thoreau, if you must know) and I've had it scrawled inside a lot of notebooks:

"Pursue, keep up with, circle round and round your life, as a dog does his master's chaise. Do what you love. Know your own bone; gnaw at it, bury it, unearth it, and gnaw it still."

Right now, my bone is about two inches down. And I'm not sure I'm giving it the full dig.