Blog Direction
I don't know why I've been so dis-interested in updating this blog in the last few weeks. But I'm feeling the need to write again. Part of my problem was deciding what to do with this blog now that we're actually underway and officially fulltiming. The options I considered were, first, to write only occasional witty insightful interpretations of what we're doing or seeing -- for instance, maybe an essay on "how small towns along the Michigan shoreline acquired their names" or maybe "a comparison of American Indian burial sites throughout the upper Midwest". Everyone would want to read things like that. It'd be great stuff. Why these essays could even be collected published after my death and become classic works. Except for the death part, that sounds really good.
My other option was to write a simple daily journal of our activities. But it'd be hard to get these published. It'd probably be hard to get anyone to read them at all. Most people have enough trouble keeping up with their own daily activities, much less spending valuable time reading about someone else's.
What to do? The first option sounds like too much work -- putting thoughts together with proper grammar and sentence structure; the coherent flowing from one point to another, from one thought to another, trying to get each essay down to exactly 500 words -- something I struggled with in high school. The second option sounds like too much work too -- having to write something every day; like having a deadline. I'm on sabbatical and shouldn't have deadlines. And a daily journal could become inane and senseless with small details no one cares a whit about... like "today I got up and made coffee, then headed for the bathroom..." No one wants to read that.
Mental struggle. Writer's block. Wringing of hands. What to do?
"Just stop it! That's what to do! Stop thinking about this blog as something it's not." I slapped myself in the face. "Just stop it! If you want to write, just write. Don't care what it looks like or sounds like or what other's might think of it. Just write!"
There. OK. I feel better now.
T
My other option was to write a simple daily journal of our activities. But it'd be hard to get these published. It'd probably be hard to get anyone to read them at all. Most people have enough trouble keeping up with their own daily activities, much less spending valuable time reading about someone else's.
What to do? The first option sounds like too much work -- putting thoughts together with proper grammar and sentence structure; the coherent flowing from one point to another, from one thought to another, trying to get each essay down to exactly 500 words -- something I struggled with in high school. The second option sounds like too much work too -- having to write something every day; like having a deadline. I'm on sabbatical and shouldn't have deadlines. And a daily journal could become inane and senseless with small details no one cares a whit about... like "today I got up and made coffee, then headed for the bathroom..." No one wants to read that.
Mental struggle. Writer's block. Wringing of hands. What to do?
"Just stop it! That's what to do! Stop thinking about this blog as something it's not." I slapped myself in the face. "Just stop it! If you want to write, just write. Don't care what it looks like or sounds like or what other's might think of it. Just write!"
There. OK. I feel better now.
T
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