Welcome!

Wow! 

I've finally entered blogging land, after teetering on the fence for a long time.  I enjoy reading friends' blogs but sometimes, on bad days, catch myself in a depressing game of comparisons.  I think blogs are a great way to reconnect with faraway friends, yet I've also seen how they limit next-door neighbors' interactions to behind the screens.

Not to mention the weighty question of if I'll even have anything interesting to say!  What to do?  In the end, though, the fact that I keep dwelling on whether I should start a blog suggests I should at least try.

I visit certain favorite blogs when I need a pep talk for motherhood. One friend's accounts contain such a zest for life and a genuine love of her role that I can't help but be inspired.  Even the mundane becomes sparkling in her retelling.

I want to be able to see my life in such a positive light, too.  (And, truth be told, to see the beauty and wonder in shadows.)  If I can convince myself with words, all the better.  Through this blog I hope to channel a lost love of writing into a new love for living.

I've deliberated over the public aspect of a blog.  Why this extension of a personal journal?  Is it because I feel the need to be validated by feedback?  Will I be the soundless tree that falls in the forest without witnesses?  Perhaps.  Still, I've decided that I need to write for myself -- if only myself -- but do so as if others are reading.  We all stand a little straighter when we think someone is watching.