The blog #1: What the hell am I doing?

I'm about to finally fill out my first entry on this blog and I feel giddy and apprehensive. I've been thinking about doing something like this for weeks. (Like everything, I have been taking this VERY seriously.) And now the time seems to have come.

Why am I doing this:

1. I first grappled with starting a blog on November 4th, 2004. Why then is crucial. I was, like so many of my friends, in mourning after the results of the U.S. election. I spent all of Nov. 3 in grief. By the 4th I was ready for action and had some idea of a nonactivist's activist page. It would be a place where I would tell who I was - a teacher, a religious Jew, a democrat, a writer, an Oberlin College alum - but not a political activist. And yet now that we are citizens of an extremely powerful country that is being completely run by a single political party, none of us can refrain from activism. If the government itself has no checks and balances system, it is up to the people. So I thought that on a nonacitvist activist website I could keep myself in check, and inspire friends, to do little things. (For example, I would love to join a debate club or something to help me with my speaking under pressure skills. I have not been able to find one yet and would love to hear of any that you know.) However, that is not the sole purpose of this blog.

2. I began to want a place to just say what I thought about things. I have so much to say and get exhausted from not saying it! One of the questions I asked myself was whether I could justify spending time on a blog. How egoistical and irresponsible! To throw my thoughts out to the world and expect anyone to care. I have decided that no damage can be done by my sharing carefully selected thoughts with anyone who will read them. I hear and see others ads all day long and there are points of view in the world that everyone must endure. Why not throw my voice into the cacaphony? If people don't want to hear or see it, they won't, but it is healthy and democratic for me to become more willing and confident about speaking my mind.

As for time... I am a writer already. The bouncing myriad of thoughts all day need some outlet, and they do not have to all become finished pieces. How great to have a public composting ground in which some of my thoughts can inspire my friends or me to write more developed and helpful pieces about whatever appears on this brainsite.

(I am so curious about whether strangers will discover and appreciate this site. At this point, I could not hope for that. But I will see where this goes.)

3. When I first considered doing this blog I had plenty to say about the act of blogging itself. I k new I would have to metablog for my first entry. But I am going to make a point of restraining myself from writing too too much. (Huge entries are a pain to read.) I also don't want to use up too much time this way. But the last comment I will make is that when I told my dear friend Joel who runs the Mishkaneer site that I was reconsidering blogging. I told him I didn't think I could spend the time on it. That maybe it wasn't worthwhile. He said, "Oh." It was a sad "oh," a disappointed "oh" and it made me hate to miss the opportunity to at least just try this out.

Cheers.