Words

Words have had an irresistable pull on me from birth (so far as I know.  I draw a bit of a blank on the first three years or so.  And there are also a lot of empty spaces in years 4 through 35 as well.  Anyway....). I had grandparents who would read to me (even the ones who lived hundreds of miles away would send me tapes of them reading books), parents who read to me, a mom who modeled her love for reading and crosswords. Apparently I was so obsessed with words I felt it necessary to smuggle out books from the school library under my dress, a fact that was permanently recorded on my kindergarten report card.  My career as a klepto was short-lived, however, and I moved on to more constructive hobbies, such as learning to read the summer between kindergarten and first grade. And I don't think I've been without a book close by my person since. I would spend hours writing stories (mostly pretty terrible ones, to be honest) while growing up and, to toot my proverbial horn, won the Young Authors competition in third grade for the enthralling tale The Magical Mouse . I have piles of diaries and journals that hold my deepest secrets from my formative years (important things like, you know, the cutest boy in class and what I planned on wearing the next day to catch his eye. Which NEVER happened, first of all, and secondly I had zero style which is moot anyway because what fifth grade boy cares what you're wearing?!).
Words are my constant comfort.  From others' I draw encouragement, knowledge, a sense of camaraderie. They are what I use to work through how I feel and think about anything and everything.  It's criminal the level of release I feel  just by posting a Facebook status that reflects things that are happening in my heart and head. Words are the way I deal.
Sometimes I struggle with this whole having a blog thing.  By its very nature it seems that it should exist for people to read.  Right? I mean, seriously, it has the potential to be so public and all.  And so I get caught up in the comparison game and looking at all of these bloggers who do it for a LIVING, for crap's sake. Or who post something that speaks of my own mind and heart far more succinctly than I could. Or I stress over the fact that mostly what I'm writing seems like complete drivel and who would want to read that anyway? And then the answer comes: me. I write these things for ME.  This is how I process and work through and figure out.  This is my life and the things that I want to remember. And if someone should stumble across these words (or have them shoved down his/her throat by the author) and feel some encouragement or gain some knowledge or maybe even have a little chuckle then that's really just icing on the cake isn't it?  That's what I'm starting to think anyway.
"Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul." ~Anne Lamott