Better Late than Never (aka, I Need You!)

I turned sixty today. Not dealing with it particularly well, truth be told. I’m finally aware that my life is not just finite (something I knew intellectually but never felt inside), but extremely finite. All that time I had to do anything I wanted to do? Well, it’s mostly ticked away.

There’s one thing I’ve always wanted to do, but never seemed to find the time to do, and that’s write. Write seriously. It’s hard to motivate myself to do that when I look at the sheer volume of material on the internet; who needs more words, really? Plus the Twitter-ization and Facebook-ification of writing, with its emphasis on short and pithy, is discouraging. Does anyone read past 90 words anymore?

But now that I have the time, I’m going to commit to seeing whether my in-my-head belief that I’m a good writer, that people will be interested in what I say, holds up in the real world.

Part of what’s always held me back was a belief that my (non-fiction, expository) writing had to be internally consistent. I couldn’t say “x” and then say (or even imply) “y” and then (God help us) say or imply “2”. But I hereby abandon that belief. It’s too limiting. I’m not one consistent whole, I’m a jumble of different, often conflicting parts. I’m permitting myself to flesh out an idea one week, and then the opposite (or tangent) idea the next. So be forewarned:  Any criticism based on inconsistency will be met with an emphatic “Yesssss!”

I’ve also been held back for fear of offending people I care about, people whose opinions matter to me. This problem arises in particular because I’m a pragmatic, common-sense, no B.S., politically middle-of-the-road Midwesterner living in one of the most liberal places in the world. Some of the things I want to write about (no, some of the things I will write about) will surely agitate the provincial bien pensants. Can’t be helped, I’m afraid. My only defense will be that I promise I’ll piss off conservatives too.

Although by training and temperament writing non-fiction essay-style pieces comes easiest to me, I’m also curious to write fiction too. I fear I don’t have the creativity to do that well, nor is it clear to me how to present fiction in a blog. So that may or may not happen. If it does, bear with me, and remember it’s not my strength.

To the few of you who are regular readers, thank you. Please stay tuned. I need you! I need to know at least one other person out there is hearing, digesting, thinking about what I write. For my part, depending on the subject, I’ll do my best to be as honest, thought-provoking, original, humorous, insightful, biting, kind, straightforward and, above all, as genuine as I can be. I look forward to your judgment as to how successful I prove to be.