After all the heaviness of recent posts, I just have to say that it feels awesome to be blogging again, gosh darn it.

I also have been catching up on reading a lot of other peoples’ blogs. It is with some embarrassment that I admit that I hadn’t figured out how to subscribe to blogs until about two weeks ago. (I’m always many steps behind others when it comes to technology. For example, I just figured out how to plug my Ipod into my car like six weeks ago.) Anyway, now it is so easy to keep up with what my favorite bloggers have to say. Who the heck knew? I am so energized by all the love and insightful ideas out there. I just want to jump in that flow of sensitive evolution.

Yeah, baby, yeah!

Right now this blog is essentially my writing practice. I actually feel like I have a lot to say these days. That old excitement about writing is coming back. It’s like being in a dysfunctional relationship, or something like that. I go through these tormented love affairs when it comes to writing. Sometimes I am totally smitten with writing. I want to write all the time. Then I get pissed at writing, disillusioned with writing. I wonder what I ever saw in writing in the first place. I tell writing that I need to take a break. It’s not writing, it’s me. Then, after a while, I consider going back to writing. I am captivated by writing. And the whole cycle begins again. It might be cool to find some kind of balance and have a like, regular writing practice. Whatever. For now, I accept my dysfunctional relationship with the written word.

At the moment there are many ideas brimming inside my head. I’m going to keep them under wraps, though, because when I make big declarations about what I am going to write about, I always seem to sabotage myself.

Frankly, unlike my 28 year-old MFA dropout self, I don’t care if I suck or not. I do care about craft, but I write these days because it just feels good to tell my little old lower-case truths. When I write I stretch myself in ways I don’t ordinarily. I love how writing is both active and contemplative. I dig how it’s essentially a solitary activity and that I need to make the space for it because I value myself (and others, by extension) enough to express what’s going on in this crazy mind and heart of mine at any given time. As the single mother of a 2.5 year old, it is a necessity, not a luxury, to make space for writing (and long baths).

I remember being seven months pregnant with Sami, at the Green Festival here in DC, listening to Ariel Gore of Hip Mama fame read from her amazing books. During the Q & A session, I raised my hand and asked some impassioned question that nakedly revealed my fear about losing touch with my writer self after becoming a mother.

“You’re gonna be fine,” she said, smiling in this totally warm and encouraging way. “You’ll find the time, you’ll make the time, and you’ll keep writing.”

It hasn’t been easy, and it hasn’t been anywhere near consistent, but she was right.