FEB 10 AND THINKING .......

It has been way over a month since my last writing. Too long to be accountable to anyone who follows me OR just happens to drop in. I have been really hung up on format and content. Recently there have been many blogs with just wonderful photos -- daily. And blogs with terrific themes. My photos are not that great and my life is boring.

Howsomever, there are things going on that need posting and discussing. AND Lent is coming up altogether too soon and I am NOT going to bog myself down into some kind of Lent ritual/discipline. What I am going to do is to be a little more active here. And hope that there are followers of my blog who will comment and participate in discussion.

I am linked on the http://www.graceb2u.com/ site which is Grace Episcopal Church. I am an active member. I am passionate about some of what is happening at Grace. I plan to talk about that -- A LOT. I have really strong opinions about 'stuff.' Sometimes that's good, sometimes not. I will always listen to another opinion with an open mind.

There are two Lent offering in which I plan to participate and I will comment on both of those. There is merger talk going on and I will certainly comment about that. The Mission Congregation that meets once a month is a reall passion of mine and I plan on commenting about this group -- which, by the way I feel is the REAL Grace Church.

Don't be shy about comments. Just be polite and respectful to one another.

TWITTER/BLATHER/PHTTTT!

Twitter seems like so much blather. Or so I am assuming from the descriptions I hear on the news and in some blogs. I don't blather -- much. Maybe why I have been so quiet here for such a long time. I need to think through things before I see the letters forming into words.

Twitter just appears to me to be brainless. Like texting, who needs to be that attached. I am thinking that I don't need to be that attached. I like to listern. I am a blog lurker and rarely comment. This is pretty much the way I am in "real" life. I sit on the sidelines and listen. When I do speak it is from the innermost part of me. Sometimes spoken without prudent self censorship. I get into a lot of trouble this way. But the truth in my heart gets put on the table. The elephant in the room is acknowledged -- sometimes too forcefully, but, hey, somebody's gotta do it.

I am too private for twitter. Anyone else's and especially my own. Maybe I am too private for blogging. Maybe that is part of my problem here. Perhaps I need to let my hair down, so to speak, and really say it the way I see it. That can get me into a lot of hot water, so to speak, so I will give it a little bit of consideration. But watch out, folks, I'm tired of rigid thinking, passive, denial ridden pew sitters. I am about to explode with frustration and continually thwarted hopefulness.

WEEK END

It is Friday. The end of the week. I am weary. No energy. No spark of interest. Just a lackluster being sitting at the computer reading other people's blogs. I have always been drawn to human interest stories and there are certainly a myriad of them being blogged.

You will note on the side bar 'Blogs I Follow' that there is a variety in the blog topics. I usually check in on them daily and sometimes, moved by the Spirit, I will leave a comment. People offer so much of themselves. I am astounded at how open people can be with their thoughts and feelings. Some of the bloggers write anonymously, others quite publicly. I congratulate those who are able to write openly and share their lives with us. I applaud and delight in their accomplishments and am encouraged to get on with my own creativity.

And I cherish the writings of the anonymous writers who are struggling with personal life issues. These struggles reach my heart and enter into my prayers

As for me, I will blather on in my mundane way until one day I will stumble upon a natural thread that will lead me into some serious blogging.

WRITERS DIGEST

At the library this afternoon I stumbled upon a copy of Writers Digest. It was one of those 'jumped off the shelf into my hand' things. The jist of the article which caught my attention was to just write. Make a dedicated decision to write fifteen minutes a day or three days a week. Just DO it. Well, folks, I have been writing pretty much daily for a few years and nothing to speak of has happened.

Our book club has been reading Ray Bradbury and his writing discipline is pretty much that -- writing every day, taking off on a word or a phrase and 'walla' he ends up with a short story in no time at all. And that short story is then transformed later on into a novel. Hmmmm. That hasn't happened to me yet. I have been playing at writing for too many years. I have about given up on any novel idea. Well, not entirely. There are nigglings in the back of my mind. But how to get them out on paper/screen. Don't know.

The article went on to discuss outlines and index card chapter headings that can be carried around and fleshed out at any given moment. Maybe. Maybe not. Novels are stories. I have to decide what the story is that I want to tell. IS there a story I want to tell. Maybe not.

The article went on further to say that some were using blogs as novel starters. Not only starters but just blogging daily and then collecting the blogs into a book. Hmmmm. The blogs I read or write are not the makings of a novel. My dad was a writer. Not a great fiction writer. Unpublished but for two short stories. He made his living writing ad copy and technical copy. I guess he was good at that. He made a living for us anyway. He would have loved blogging. So maybe I'll just continue to write my pages and write my blog and if anything happens, it happens.

Blogging

Obviously I'm very new at this blogging thing. What happened to all the paragraph spaces? Will certainly have to work on cleaner posts.

Have been trying to get a picture up so that y'all can see who's blogging and to whom you are replying. Well, forget a picture. We have taken dozens and they all look DUMB. If the smile is right, my eyes are close; if my eyes are open, I look startled or glazed; a serious pose ends up looking sad or sappy -- ridiculous. We gave up. Then I had the brilliant idea of "feet." Yes, pictures of my feet. In sandals so you could see my toes. I think you can probably tell a lot about a person from their feet. Maybe not as much as a face, but close. Tried that. Still workin' on it.