you heard it here first

My Mom commented to me recently that I write things here that I can't say in person. Actually she may have said won't, I'm not really sure at this point, but it makes little difference. One's the same as the other, wouldn't you say? Now she said this to me last weekend, but for some reason I got thinking about it again today. I wasn't sure exactly how to take what she said. Or rather how she meant me to take it.

You see she is right, to a point. I view this blog as a journal, a diary if you will, and one tends to write things they wouldn't necessarily say out loud in a diary. Of course there is one big difference between this blog and the carefully guarded diary of my teenage years. The level of security. The tiny gilt edged book where I scribbled all of my wonderfully profound teenage insight came equipped with it's very own lock, that, let's face it, was only for show. It had no real power. A stiff tug would have rendered it useless, but it was there, lulling me with that false sense of security. Now, two decades later my diary goes out live to the entire world the second I hit publish. So that tends to change how I write a bit.

Instead of writing to myself, now I write to an audience. I write to the future, to the girls. I'm writing their story as well as my own. I have a loyal following here, many of whom are friends I see and speak to on a regular basis. Often what I write one evening I get feedback on the following morning. More than one conversation has been brought to a halt because a member in the group hadn't read the latest post. So at times I hold back. Keeping a story to myself because I plan on writing about it later. I'm not sure how I feel about that yet. I mean there's the obvious argument of detriment of choosing the impersonal over the personal, but I really don't feel I'm at a "crisis level" just yet. I feel capable of maintaining a healthy balance.

I have always been better at writing my feelings down then really talking about it. I get all tongue tied and verklempt when things turn mushy. Remember I'm the girl who wrote a nice thank you note to Abby's teacher and then was incapable of actually talking about said note. And some of you may be surprised to hear that I cry, quite easily. I am near tears every time Abby sings in church and that's every other Sunday people. I watered up when Maya was baptized. Countless songs make me weep and I can't tell you how many times I've cried watching Grey's Anatomy or Extreme Makeover Home Edition. I really work at hiding all my mushiness from the general public. I'm not really sure why, but I do. Probably has a lot to do with me being shy AND socially awkward. This place gives me a spot to let that out just a little bit. So you'll find me here writing about things like missing my Dad before you'll find me sitting down to talk about it. It's not that I don't want to talk about it, but rather I don't need to because I have here and this is what here is for. If there comes a time that need changes, Mom, you'll be the first to know. Love you!