The formidable task of keeping this blog alive

I'm a ridiculously lax blogger. Sometimes it's the sheer jealousy I hold (or maybe that's contempt?) for others' more extensive musings on the web (Hulles, your capaciousness and veracity make me sick with envy!) It's not that I don't have too much time on my hands, because I do ...

Anyway, I've been thinking lately about what makes a writer "a writer." I write all the time, but it's mostly blather. Right now, thoughts of a series of short stories are muddling around in my brain, but no matter how much I try to find that right balance of wit and panache with well-constructed sentences, I find myself hitting the delete button a lot. My friend, James, is a writer. He doesn't get paid for it (yet), but he can't help himself. He has thoughts, stories, or just a couple of words written down on scraps of paper, on his computer and in notebooks. He HAS to write. I, on the other hand, force myself to write. I spend far too much time with my nose buried in the pages of other, more disciplined writers rather than sitting at this damned laptop and creating for myself.

But then again, I've never even kept a journal. I'm too afraid someone will tear out a page or two and leak it to the press someday when I'm doing something that would compel the American public to opine on my worthiness and devise an appropriate public-shaming ceremony. Just ask emh. I have to keep her on the payroll in order to ensure that her journals from the late '80s never see the light of day.