i thought of you.

"One true sentence. I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, ‘Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.’ So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there. It was easy then because there was always one true sentence that I knew or had seen or had heard someone say. If I started to write elaborately, or like someone introducing or presenting something, I found that I could cut that scrollwork or ornament out and throw it away and start with the first true simple declarative sentence I had written." ~Ernest Hemingway 

The temptation came today. It came a few minutes ago. To be too tired. Because it's late and I don't want to and would it really matter anyway? Then, I thought of you. I thought of you sitting there on the other side of this computer screen, clicking to see if there was a new post, a new something in my little corner of this blogging world…and that thought would not let me alone. Because, I could not leave you sitting there with nothing. Disappointed that I didn't show up today. So, I'm sitting here on the other side of the screen, thinking about all the things I could be doing and remembering that none of them are as important as this. Yes, there will be days when I don't post. There will be days when life gets in the way…but then, in order to write, life must be lived. In order to have something to tell, there must be stories crafted on my end. It would seem to me, the very best way to write is to live. 

I'm learning. I'm beginning to understand that if I let one day pass without writing, the muscle that I'm building will become lazy and sore, not wanting to move. So, this quote rings quite true:

"I write. I write every single day. 

Doesn't matter if anyone reads it or doesn't read it. 

I write."  

~James Patterson

I write. Doesn't matter if anyone reads it. Or doesn't read it. But you do read it. This thought is crazy to me. 

When I was a little girl, I dreamed of having my name printed on a book with the word "by" in front of it. That was my ultimate goal. I have spiral bound notebooks filled with words that I knew would be published one day, because that's what happened when a writer wrote anything, right? Oh for the days before reality painted a different picture. A picture of stories sent back, of needing agents, and publishers, and not knowing of editors or first and second and third drafts. I just wrote. 

Then the world changed. Where once it was hard to publish anything, where an industry demanded degrees and talent and something worth while, there suddenly sprang up from some unknown world something new: the blog. With the click of a button, you suddenly had an audience, no filters, no editing, no worthy words needed. Just click. And this is not me trying to bite the hand that I would like one day to feed me;) This is me just being amazed at the ease with which we can now "publish" to an audience what we want to say. This is me being seriously grateful in a way, that I can write to an audience that will listen. Yes, I still want to write a book or several (depending on how ambitious I am on any given day) but, until that happens, or until my writing is "discovered" I still get to write and have others read the words penned immediately. Whoa. That's pretty dang amazing. 

However, I've realized something. The more I enter into this blogging world, the more I discover some AMAZING writers who have some seriously worthwhile words to share…and the more I discover some writers who have some seriously ridiculous not worth your time words to write. I don't want to be the latter. I would be the kind of writer that enriches your days whether the words are serious or silly, dramatic or random, I still want them to not be…crap;) I want to make it worth your while to open up my posts and read the words here.

So, let my pen dwell not on that which will tear you down, but on that which will give you wings to fly to worlds unknown. A place of fairies and trolls, of dragons and knights, of love and bitterness, of reality and fantasy. For to write well, I believe there must be a balance between the two. To write well you must believe that I have walked the path to fairy land while keeping a firm hold of our own. That I have opened the door to Narnia, but come back again. So, let my pen dwell on these things. Let it write of ordinary days full of ordinary moments made extraordinary in their simple beauty. Let it dwell on how human we are and how much we are loved by the Living God. Let it dwell on heart ache and healing, on emotions and all that go with them, while walking out what we should despite how we feel. Let it dwell on this. And thank you for reading.