A Post-Perfect World

Suppose I were to quit this and write a more serious blog. Would I really need to focus the content? I've a feeling I would. While just blurting out whatever I happen to think of is good for me, and people who know me might be into it (though no one appears to have been reading me lately), it serves no useful purpose in terms of public expression. If I want to challenge myself to Produce, I need to focus a blog on the subject matters I can be impassioned to Produce about. And what are these?

History, particularly local history. Why? Because I'm obsessed with knowing every tiny detail in the event I ever write historical fiction. Because I'm fascinated with The Way Things Were, especially in the regions I've called home. Because I dream of time machines.

Geography, sort of. The lay of the land, photographs of it, impressions of it, observations of how it has changed and the evidence that change leaves behind. Travel photography too, though I haven't traveled much lately, and my old business trip pictures aren't as interesting after the passage of time as I hoped they'd be.

Scans of pictures taken before digital photography, taken before my time, taken by my grandfathers when the world was different than it is now.

Speculations / commentary / noodlery about Writing ... maybe. That can easily turn into more navel-glazing, and it's the navel-glazing I want to avoid. Not that there's anything wrong with it! Though I do it too much, I (usually) like reading it when "you" do it. It's all about other points of view, fresh trains of thought that can kick off some of my own. But I also have things to think about Writing, and sometimes thinking about it leads to writing about it (not least because writing helps me know what I'm thinking).

A sort of general idea on a focus is emerging here.

I won't do it soon. I really don't like sitting down and making a new blog space and setting it all up with templates and formats and blah de blah. For some, that's the fun part, and I can understand that because it used to be for me too. But no more. I want it ready to go. Not ready to go is a major reason I haven't done it yet.

Another is just plain ol' time. I really do have a lot to do that doesn't brook sitting on my ass typing. My journaling, for example? It only happens when I'm at work and already sitting on my ass at a keyboard. Weekends are largely blanks in the record of life. There's so much to DO.

And this one won't disappear. I suspect a place to drop half-formed thoughts like these will always serve a useful purpose. I'm just using it to think now. Think out loud. Think out loud so that with luck I find out what you think out loud too.