living...and writing

Unlike my initial launch of this blog, I no longer want it to be about anything. If I feel like writing about my parents, books, learning how to knit, my students, my vices, my fears, my hopes, I'm going to write about them. I've always been terrified by the idea of an audience, to the point where it's ruined my writing. It's prevented me from being really honest, and it's stopped me from taking real risks, both killers in writing. The idea of having an audience even led me to demand that all of my writing was something worthwhile, which totally negates the purpose of most expressive writing: to express one's feelings, thoughts, ideas, frustrations, dreams, fears. Not to be a Woolf or a Cisneros or a Marquez. At least, not on the first draft. Not in the journal.

So I'm trying to redirect my thinking. I want both my journals and my blogs to be places where I can express myself in words rather than through lesson plans or dance or bicycling or gardening. And right now, I don't want or need an audience. So if you're out there reading, know that I'm no longer focusing this blog on the economy or on teaching, but rather, simply on "living in interesting times."

April Biker

This morning, I was a bird in the April rain. Not a particularly coordinated or fast bird, but a bird nonetheless, flying down the suburban hills on my bike, hundreds and thousands of droplets of water splashing up onto my biking pants and around my eyes and cheeks. And I could smell that rare, wonderful smell that only those in green climates who pay attention get to smell: the scent of April rain at dawn. The smell of the earth awakening to spring.