Eating My Words

I love the sparkles of the holiday season--lights are all aglow at our house. Cowgirl, my daughter, especially threw a lot of gusto into decking the halls. Or at least into decking the Christmas tree. 

Which was why she found it so disturbing that tree ornaments started appearing randomly around the house. 

Pip and Jelly, our hooligan kittens, were treating the tree as their very own toy hanger. 

I reassured my daughter. I said, "It's okay. If we move the ornaments up high, the kittens won't be able to reach them, and everything will be safe."

Per usual, I had to eat my words. 

 

Doesn't she look smug?

I'm hoping to eat other, more yummy things as well this holiday season. I'm especially thinking about cheesecake. Although if eating words would make me more productive with writing, I'd be up for that as well. 

Thanks to all who made last week's Friday Feature fun. Happy holidays to all, I hope you like my gift to you, images of a cat in a tree. :) 

Not inspired yet? Okay. Just for you, I'll throw in an extra cat, and a falling star:

Menaces, my kittens.

I wish you peace during this holiday season! 

Pitch Perfect: THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE

Once in a great while, I read a book which feels achingly, beautifully, pitch perfect.

And I know that book will live on for a long time within me. Forever. Or as long as my forever lasts.

When I was a child, many, many books lived inside me. Their characters became friends who lived past the covers of the book, and into adventures within me. But now, it takes a special book. Maybe I have finite space, or maybe I'm more discerning.

I just turned the last page of THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE. I shed my tears, I smiled my laughs. And now the book lives within me.

That is, it lives within the reader side of me. It made the writer side of me give up writing. How could I possibly add my substandard words to the book world after reading a book in which no word was misused or extraneous? Pitch perfect I am not.

I gave up. For a moment. And then I came back around. And picked up the pen.

When I was a teen*, I made many messes with relationships and people. Life was messy, and because it was messy, it hurt. I felt like I wanted to escape, but that would mean escaping me.

I was the mess.

I couldn't move beyond my mistakes. THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE, reminded me, with startling clarity, that when you start living as yourself--when you start choosing for yourself--life gets messy. You make life messy. But there is hope for coming out the other side--into grace, and into YOU.

So, when I write a big old mess, there is hope that it will come out to the other side (of revision and hard work), and become something achingly beautiful. Jandy Nelson, you've raised the bar high. Thank you.

 



*Okay, to be perfectly honest, there are days when I still feel like a mess. There just aren't quite as many of them as there used to be. :)

The People in My Head

So, I've been thinking about what makes a great blog. And I was struck by what Paul Murphy said in comments on Friday, when asked about his blogging purpose:

My goal with the blog is to entertain and to appreciate the people who read the thing. If I do those two things well enough, I figure people will keep reading and new readers will find their way there.

And it struck me--this is what makes some blogs so great to hang out at. Great blog hosts are clearly starting a conversation for me. Yes, ME (and YOU). Paul knows we're out here, reading it, and he wants to entertain us a while.

There is a great atmosphere at Paul's blog because it is clear that the blog is as much about the followers as it is about Paul. It's no thinly disguised medium for self-promotion. Well, maybe it is. All blogs are, at their root, about self-promotion. But Paul does it really well, because of his intentions. And because his intentions are respectful.

Is this too simplistic? If you entertain, then people will appear, to be entertained? If you build it, they will come? Very mystical, very magical. But I think this is true, in this day and age when word of mouth has morphed into a world of clicks and links.

And respect is a difficult thing to achieve in a medium where sarcasm and humor can be misconstrued as insensitivity or meanness. I agonize over some comments that I have left on blogs. Did they know that I was joking? Should I delete it?

My intention for writing my blog? Well, it's funny. When I write for my blog, I feel as though I am having a conversation with the voices inside my head.

I see all your cute/handsome/meaningful little avatars over there on the right, but I still feel like I'm going a little crazy, writing all this as if you were real. It's why I love your comments, and why I post writer interviews. Because it's proof of my sanity. (Okay, and because I want to be able to say, I knew you when...)

I feel this way, I think, because at first, my intention simply was to carve out my own little corner of the universe, where I could tuck my thoughts, and writing journal, and goals, and links to fun stuff. And be able to find everything later. I never really believed that if I wrote it, you would read it. But, since you do read it, my blog is evolving into something much more meaningful than just a conversation within my head.

It's like how your writing changes after the first time you find a great critique partner. Suddenly you have an audience. And knowledge of that audience changes your writing. Intention translates into actions.

So, I thank you all, figments of my imagination. Thanks for reading. Thanks for sharing. Thanks for making this a meaningful place to be.

And, just in case your requirement for an entertaining blog includes stylish accoutrement, check out this awesome bag*.

So, what are your intentions for blogging, and what do you think makes for an exceptional blog? Do you feel you have a responsibility to your followers? And, if you have decided not to blog, then why not?

*Disclaimer--that purse is one of my aunt and uncle's eco-friendly bags, and occasionally I get awesome bags from them, and lots of love. And, even though I'm biased, their stuff is wonderful!