August 30/13

A year ago today, I had an idea.

I was looking over my Now What blog, and I was frustrated.  I knew there were things I needed to write about, but I was too angry, frustrated, lazy, ambivalent, busy, etc. to put the effort in.  Whenever I was writing, it felt like a chore, and I was basically "phoning it in" on some entries.  I knew it was time for a change.

I was also going through a phase where I wanted more privacy then usual, and this led me to a period of introspection.

Then I got this idea...

What if I chose just one thing a day to write about.  Whether it was something happening to me, or in the world, or a piece of media, just...whatever.  And it had to be something that I wanted to share, or even needed to share in order to work through my psychological process of dealing with it.

It would be a way of maintaining my connection to the world while I worked through my privacy issues (an ongoing process, even now), and let those who cared to read know that I wanted to include them in these moments.

And here we are, a year later.  Some of these moments haven't been worth sharing, like when I'm bored, have done nothing, or was too sick to function, but for the most part, these moments have reminded me to stop shutting out the world, and to be a participant in it.

I've wondered about the fruits of my labour over the last year.  September 1st marks the one year anniversary of the first share, and I have learned over the year that I'm writing more for my benefit than for the benefit of others.  I'm sorry if that sounds bad, but I am seeing the google analytics, and I know I'm not writing for a crowd of hundreds.  Or even tens.  So, knowing this, I wondered if I'm just selfishly ranting and need to stop, or whether I should continue.

But then I know that there are people reading these posts daily, and this is a way for them to stay connected to me.  These damn social networks...they appear to keep us connected, but that connection is a front for the fact that actually, we're losing touch because we don't actually speak anymore.  Travel is prohibitively expensive these days, so it's not like trips to see these people are a real possibility most of the time.  Phone conversations have become really awkward for me.  Texting someone how much you miss them just seems...wrong, somehow.  So slowly, I've talked myself into continuing for another year, while I continue to work on being a better friend, sister, daughter, etc.

Here's to an idea...

...Wish you were here.