This should have been my first post.   But then I've never been known for doing things in the accepted order, so I guess it's appropriate that my thoughts about why I've started blogging isn't the first thing that I put up.  Here goes...

I miss writing letters.  I miss the excitement of going to mailbox and finding a letter or two or three.  I miss the exchange of thoughts and ideas.   My college roommates were always jealous that I got so many letters.  "You have to write ‘em to get 'em", I'd tell them.  I've written letters all my life.  I'd meet someone on vacation and bam, I had another pen pal.  "Wow, you write really great letters.  It's just like I'm talking to you."  That's what I always heard.  Over the years they came and went but gradually they just went as communication went electronic.  I first embraced email as just a way to get letters where they were going faster...and that meant more letters to write and receive...a good thing.  I was quite surprised to find that others didn't see it that way.  My friends said email letters came too fast, it was too hard to find time to write.  But they didn't really want to keep writing the old fashioned way either...it was too slow.  Letters became notes, which became posts, which became tweets. 

"Why don't you blog?" they said, "I love to read your letters."  Blog?  put my thoughts out there for strangers to dissect and trample?  I cringed at the thought.  What if people didn't like what I had to say?  What if they thought it (or I) was stupid or silly?  What if they laughed?  Or worse, were indifferent?  My friends aren't so critical but strangers?  So I just stuck to doing short posts on FaceBook and feeling frustrated; I had all these words inside and nowhere for them to go.  Then I started reading the FaceBook blog of a friend of a friend and admired that he just talked about whatever he wanted...joys, sorrows, problems, solutions, nature, nurture and all things in between.  And he didn't worry if someone didn't like it.  He's inspired me to take this step.  I haven't quite gotten to the point of not caring what other people think.  And I'm hiding a bit by posting here because no one that I know, knows that I'm doing it.  But it feels good to be writing again and have the possibility that someone reads it.  That's why a journal never worked for me.  I knew that my thoughts were just staying there in my drawer.  To feel satisfied, I have to know that my thoughts are going somewhere and that there is the possibility of touching someone, somewhere.