Blog For One

The Blurry-Faced People are BAAAACK!

It's been five years since I posted here, and I'm only returning grudgingly.  I really had been enjoying NOT flexing my creative wings or having to put my thoughts into well-articulated sentences (not that my previous posts were truly well-articulated).  I didn't mind NOT spending hours obsessing over a little essay no one was going to read anyway.  I had NO PROBLEMS using any free time I had to watch Netflix instead of write inane things.  But it's really my own fault that I've been forced back:

A couple of years ago, I thought it would be a brilliant idea to have this blog printed and bound so I could have a hard copy of it.  Then I could delete it from the World Wide Web and no future blackmailers could find it online and use it against me.  So I spent a good chunk of change to have two volumes created via Blog2Print (shout out!).

So professional!

It was pretty easy, though I chose the option of printing that meant the pictures didn't line up with the captions, so the books will suddenly have a sentence in the middle of a post that makes no sense unless you can figure out that it's the caption for the photo printed 2 paragraphs ago. 

Aaannd . . . there's the problem

By the time I got around to printing out those books, Mr. C was old-enough to read them (and -- horror of horrors -- old-enough to understand them).  He, Bee and I started reading out loud a post or two a night from the comfort of our living room couch, and the books and their pictures were a fun little time capsule for us.  Which, I suppose, is what a blog is meant to be.

Mr. C's favorite posts, of course, are the ones about him.  Bee's favorite posts, of course, are the ones not about him, since those often skew to the snitty-rant side.  My favorite posts have some humor to them; otherwise, I don't care what they're about.  It's embarrassing to read some of the things I thought were funny then that now seem mean (like the "Gender-Challenged Turtle" in Curse You, Wonder Pets!); if I were well-known or important, cancel culture would have a heyday with me for sure.

Anyway, the worst thing to come from re-reading this blog is not the cringe-iness of it: it's the fact that Mr. C actually likes it and wants to read more.  He adores hearing all about his younger self (ahh, so like his self-absorbed mother!), and wants me to post about our current world.

This is tricky, for several reasons:

1) Before, Mr. C was too young to read the blog, so I could tattle on him or relay embarrassing anecdotes and he wouldn't know.

2) Before, Mr. C was too young to read the blog, so I could tattle on Bee or relay embarrassing anecdotes and Mr. C wouldn't tell him "Mom wrote about your meltdown today."

3) I am now five years older, which -- for me -- means five years lazier.  Why would I want to spend my free time writing when I could waste an hour scrolling through Instagram, instead?

and

4) A big reason I used to blog was to express myself: it was a way to let out the frustrations that came from having a toddler and trying to balance the work/home life.  Five years of practice later, and I don't have those same frustrations.

(Or maybe I'm just afraid blogging will bring out new frustrations?)

At any rate, Mr. C has been begging me for a year to blog again.  And I am nothing if not a slave to my child (in between all the times I sit on the couch and tell him to make me a snack or heave a beleaguered sigh when he claims his 102-degree fever is making him feel sick and he needs me to bring him soup).  So, selfless mother that I am, I finally broke down and gave him this as a Christmas present: I will commit to seven blog posts -- one a month -- due on the 4th.  If I write more than that, fine; but I'm setting the bar low with the expectation of barely clearing it by July.

Sigh; at least I never got around to deleting this account, so I don't have to re-start any of that.  But I DO have to relearn how to upload pictures and publish things.  And I've already been interrupted twice by Bee needing my attention, so the challenges of five years ago are back in play.  At least I don't have to feel guilty about blogging instead of paying attention to my kid: Mr. C is happily ensconced in his own computer world, anyway (it is so much easier to be a parent of a 13-year-old and just not give a sh!t about screen-time anymore!). 

just a blurry-faced boy, his cat, and his computer

 

And so we shall begin.  The challenge will be finding a topic to blog about that I find amusing (or else what's the point?), that interests Mr. C (namely: Mr. C), but that won't embarrass Mr. C (how can I possibly write an entertaining post without embarrassing someone?).

But at least my focus with this blog has changed.  It used to be about self-expression and writing for all the strangers who might come upon it and love it and offer me a book deal (ha!).  Now it will be about self-expression, but the target audience is an audience of one: the young man in the next room who just wants a little chronicle of his teenage years.  

 Maybe he'll find he doesn't like knowing his mom's perspective on something that just happened, or is happening right now.  Maybe he'll find he wants this scrapbook of his life, and will refer to it when he's older.  Maybe he'll read this post, think "Oh, God, what have I done?", and never read another.  

We'll find out.  I'm sure he'll have lots of thoughts and criticisms about these posts, but I hope he'll also be pleased with parts of them.  These teenage years can be tough, and the years he happens to be a teen in right now are already ridiculously stupid.  If he has written proof that someone is not just watching him but seeing him, and cares about all his struggles and triumphs and the banalities of his days . . . then isn't that a good thing?