I have been inspired.

Having newly come to the world of blogging, I happened across this blog.  Having been thoroughly entertained by Lady Susan, I decided to set off on my own writing adventure.  I do not expect to be nearly as entertaining or as witty as Lady Susan, however, this adventure will give me the chance to write about many things which I want to share.  I currently have another blog which is available for my family, close friends, and my children's birth families to see.  However,  there are certain things which I don't necessarily want to share with all of them (for example, my sometimes use of  "family cloth".  Of course, it is the first thing I mention here, so you can know right away what you may be getting into.  I'd rather share that with complete strangers.)  In this blog, I expect to write about whatever random thing I want to share at the time. 

First ramble of the blog:  I do not generally consider myself a writer.  I actually commonly say, and feel, that I hate to write.  I think that the reason for that starts back in 6th grade when I heard some girls making fun of my friend's poetry.  I had been writing what I considered to be pretty good poetry, but I started to feel like maybe I couldn't write for my own enjoyment.  I might be mocked!  What if I used the wrong word?  What if it sounded babyish?  What if someone thought less of me after reading my writing? 

The next time period I remember really having an impact on my like of writing (I don't know how much I ever really loved it) was during 8th grade in my English class.  We had to write all sorts of stories.  First, we had to do a rough draft...AND THEN HAVE OUR PEERS CRITIQUE AND PROOFREAD IT!  Then a second draft...AND HAVE OUR PEERS CRITIQUE AND PROOFREAD IT!  (There may have been yet another round of this humiliation.)  Then a final draft, which we could turn in.  Being something of a perfectionist, I would critique and correct as I wrote.  There was no way that I was willing to consciously leave in misspellings or improper punctuation, etc.  The final result of my refusal to let anyone see anything but my best in the first place, was a lack of the proper amount of drafts (since once I finally showed any of my writing to any of my peers, I rarely, if ever, got any corrections; how can you make more than one draft without any changes?), and therefore, a poor grade in the class.  If this was what writing was, I didn't like it.

My dislike of writing caused me, at times, to make some poor choices in school.  In 9th grade, I got a D- in a class because I refused to turn in the two main projects which involved writing reports (I believe they also involved other scary things like interviewing people, but that may have been a different class).  I dropped out of a class mid-course during college because I was overwhelmed by the amount of writing I would have to do.  It was a really interesting course too.

My fear of writing has been the main cause of my not completing my degree.  Why torture myself?  And forget even thinking about doing a Master's...a THESIS???!!!!  Never in a million years!

Now, lest you think that my angst about writing has caused a permanent writer's block until this moment, let me put your worries to rest.  I actually have written a fair amount of papers that have been required of me for various reasons.  I have also semi-faithfully kept a journal.  But to purposely set out to do something like, say, write a book sounds about as fun to me as walking on a bed of nails.

I give you this information, dear readers, in the hopes that you will be easy on me.  Try not to make fun of me.  Overlook any improper punctuation, poor grammar, misspellings, overuse of parentheses and ... (whatever those dotdotdot things are called), annoying repetition, annoying repetition, annoying repetition, um...or any other flaws in my ramblings.  I say this hypocritically, because I often notice these things in other people's writings (but not on purpose!).  I try really hard to see past it, though.

Having written all that, I look up and see that I can't find a spellcheck button!  Also, no right-clicking on a word to see synonyms.  What if I used the wrong word (is angst even the right word to put in?  Is is spelled correctly?)? -(Is that where the question mark even belongs?!!!)  Stress is starting to build up.  I could check my dictionary and my writing guide to make sure, but do I really want to stop this before it gets off the ground?  That could make this whole adventure too overwhelming.  I take a deep breath and decide.  I'll just write.