It’s the last week of January and I’ve been terribly remiss in posting. 2009 has ushered in many changes. A new work assignment. Home renovations (well, the entire interior of our home is being repainted, polished and redone; we’ve had a crew here for three weeks.) Our social and family commitments have kept us pretty busy during our limited downtime. These are legitimate reasons about what has kept me away from chicken-scratch.

But to me, they sound like excuses. And so, I’ll share a secret with you: I started the blog to keep my writing alive, to find an audience for my unpublished works. Along the way, I met some really cool, intelligent women writers BUT I didn’t really write anything new. I posted lots of pretty pictures and shared some prose - but didn’t really share anything too risky. I wanted my prose to be polished and pure - free from any critique.

It’s because words carry so much weight. I expect the written word to be perfect, profound, whole. And so, I wrote myself into a box. I wanted a friendly readership, an adoring readership to nurse my ego and affirm that my writing, that I, have talent.

• No need to write about sex. Too dirty, too earthy.
• No need to write about relationships. Too real and would leave me expostulating. Or worse, gasping for air.
• No need to write about death. OK - so I did post about my father’s passing and my mother’s passing - but not the grittiness of their deaths. The death of one’s parents make you do crazy things. And not once have I talked about the crazy.
• No need to write about my life. Other than in the most general of terms, because the blogosphere is full of stalkers. And yet, I belong to Facebook and post 140 character updates on Twitter.

And so I collected and posted quotes, photos and articles. And wrote the pithiest of posts.

I turned 41 in October. Maybe this marks my middle-age crisis? Perhaps. What I do know that in order for me to reconnect with this blog, chicken scratch is going to get a whole lot louder, messier and less constrained.

My first drafts and postings may not be polished but they’ll certainly be authentic. My writing may be erratic - and you may see many iterations of the same piece - but at least you’ll get to hear my voice and see how my art progresses.

What good is this blog, if it’s just pretty to look at?