Stage Fright

I kept a journal as part of a writing class in high school. It was a pleasant assignment. The journal was just a place to write down thoughts, ideas, and feelings. A blog seems similar in nature; a little bit like a diary, only public. I liked writing that journal because it did not require the same effort as formal papers and short stories. Just like Forrest Gump “just ran”, in a journal, you just write.

My original intent with this blog was to write down a bunch of stories about our kids. However, I am not sure that they would appreciate seeing their childhood in public print, so I have chilled that thought for the moment. Perhaps I should get their approval before I proceed.

So far I have only written one story about an incident at soccer practice involving my son, John, when he was in elementary school. I am not happy with the way the story is written, and may never be, so you do not see it in this blog. It was in the process of rewriting that story for the umpteenth time that I came to appreciate the dilemma of writers. How to they ever determine that the piece of work is finished?

I spent forever writing that soccer story, dithering over every word. If I spent the time to work on the story until I was happy with it I would never get another thing written. I changed every word at least twice and I am still not happy with it. Someone with a modest knowledge of grammar is likely to discover a host of improprieties.

So there is a stage fright factor. What if the readers, both of you, find out I am an imposter? I am not a writer. I write computer queries. I write SQL. I develop policies and procedures. I manage people and an office budget. My real-life writing experience consists of annual reports, executive summaries, and programming specifications. I studied math and physics, not English.

Like most people, I am a bit self-conscious. I’d like the readers of this blog to think that I am smarter than I am, or at least make a favorable impression. What if I am actually exposing my ignorance through poor writing but I don’t even know how poor my writing is?

Anyway, I really need to get over all that, or just not give a damn.

Run Forrest, Run!

Write, Tom, Write.