Why

OK, so why am I doing this? I've been a blog lurker for maybe a year and a half. Not too often, but a few people I know had blogs and I read them, never commenting. Much too self conscious. But periodically I would have some thoughts I wanted to jot down. Hey, I am approaching middle age so I am completely comfortable with pen and paper. But I am also an amazing typist, and this is much, much faster and easier. Actually, I consider typing to be THE most useful high school class. In what would later become pretty damn ironic, I was placed in high school typing after being kicked out of my first computer class (typing was prerequisite, duh). So now I can type 70+ words per minute, but computers intimidate the hell out of me. Damn.

But I digress. The actual impetus for starting this was from slate.com, a new feature called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. If I knew computers better, I would link to it here. I'll talk to some people and hopefully get that worked out. So she challenges folks to begin their own happiness project. That might sound a little hokey. But as mentioned above . . . I'm approaching middle age. Which doesn't feel quite (nearly!) as old as I thought it would. But neither did turning 21 so I shouldn't have been surprised. Also, I used to be an interesting person. I used to write poetry, journal, take artistic photos, have deep thoughts. What happened to me? Having kids, going to school, getting a job, cleaning my house. Maybe a little gift to myself would be to celebrate the beginning of my fifth decade (oh my god, that sounds even worse than 40) by reflecting on past, present, future. When I was in high school, I did a project that I titled Reflections of a Drowning Vegetable and on the cover drew a carrot sinking in the deep blue sea--an allusion to feeling like I was drowning in my own depth. I no longer feel like a drowning vegetable. Overall, I'm pretty happy. But I would like a little more depth and reflection in my life. So this is as good a place to start as any.