The Rebirth of a Blog

Once upon at a time, I started a blog. This blog was always meant to go hand-in-hand with my “actual” writing efforts…my attempts to create short stories and publish. The blog was merely a tool to help me find a way to be accountable to those writing fits and starts. It was to be a part of a larger project, ending at some point before a new creative writing project began.

Along the way, the blog became important because my life spiraled out of control. I used it as a means of communication with someone I loved who read it regularly, even when her life was unrecognizable. So, I continued to spew my thoughts and feelings into the ether, convinced that I could reach her and no longer accountable to my own life or writing process. In some ways, this is my do over, my apology blog to those who continued to read faithfully, but no longer understood the purpose, as well as to entice back those who jumped ship understandably because the blog no longer suited the reason for which they started reading.

Although, in many ways, life still madly circles the drain, the blog itself has come full circle. In bringing it back to the original starting point, the beginning where it accompanied my own creative writing progress, I realize two things. First, that I can’t communicate or control anyone through this blog. I can record my thoughts, but it must have a meaning, a purpose. Second, although the blog itself was never my true purpose, it has become an important means of inspiring me, encouraging me to write on my projects, to keep my fires burning as a short story creator, a method of hearing and understanding and weaving the stories in my head.

This blog is about more than my wider life audience or my own stories. It has come into its own as a form of creative expression. For that reason, it deserves to see the light of day regularly. I struggle still as a writer. I am desperate to gather the time, energy and resources to give life to the voices in my head. This is not a catchall blog or a way to express the varying emotions I feel about living in general. Instead, this blog was born to find my path to expression as a writer and I am unwilling to let it go for that reason.

I attended a Press Publish/ WordPress conference in Portland this past weekend. I confess, I only made it to half of the conference, but the workshops I attended taught me a great deal. I may never find fame or fortune through my writing, either of stories or blogs, but I can find meaning. Instead of being a tagalong effort, an afterthought to a greater project, this blog can stand alone. The words I have about my writing efforts and about finding a life that doesn’t leave that writing behind are important in and of themselves. If I never publish a book, which hopefully won’t be the case, these words I write in this blog are still torn from me, birthed in a way that makes them hopeful and meaningful.

The conference showed me some technical tricks, some methods of increasing readership and beefing up my design and learning techniques to make this blog product even better. Most importantly, I learned that I have something to say. I can fit a niche and if it never really grows, I’m okay with that. In the meantime, I can still throw my words out there via this blog and see what sticks. It’s worth the effort and not as a secondary means of expressing myself while writing my stories. This blog is important in other ways. Perhaps I can touch someone like me, someone struggling to create, someone coming to terms with life and still finding a way, in the hustle and bustle, of being an artist.

Finally, I refer to the voices in my mind a lot. And, they are there struggling to be heard through my stories and creative writing. But, my voice is also struggling to be heard…the one that belongs only to me. This blog gives me outlet and expression. Writing is my biggest passion, the beating heart of my life story. What better place to give it outlet that in a form those others may recognize?

You may see changes in the blog. You may see redesigns and new efforts to find a home. You may witness a renewed effort at writing and recording the travails of a writer. However, underneath it all, what you are really seeing is a new understanding. As much as my characters deserve voices, so do I. This blog is my ally, my friend in faithfully telling a tale that deserves to be told. A new voice is pushing its way forward, one that had been disenfranchised and discounted.
That voice is my own.