Welcome to the mother of all blog posts told by a father part two. If you missed the first one you are welcome to go back and read it. I am working hard to do the things that I need to do to live my dreams.
Lately writing has been more of a struggle, not to produce content because that is never a problem. The problem has been that I have been coming up short of the mark I set for me.
That is because I am shooting for work that makes me cry and that is something that rarely happens. I have a destination, an objective and a target in mind. I am resolute in doing my best to get there but I know instinctively that to do it I need to smash some walls.
Not the kind of walls that come from losing weight using the greatest exercise ever but the kind that live inside my head. I feel a bit like I am walking through a crowded rave. It is packed full of people and nothing makes a lot of sense.
Yet everything makes sense because I know that what I seek is being hidden from me. The information is there. I feel it calling my name and there is this magnetic pull to it.
If you saw me play basketball you’d see that I have a habit of sending myself hurtling after the ball. It doesn’t matter what is in my way I am usually going to try to jump over, step around or if need be run through to get to it.
Some of these thoughts and feelings are no different from those I expressed in the first post but there is one small distinction. Now I am confident and convinced that the path I am on is correct. It may be unmarked but I just have faith.
Faith that if I keep pressing I will find what I am looking for.
What Am I Looking For?
Some of it is simple. I want to clean up my blog so that it looks nicer, loads faster and leaves a better impression on my readers and guests. I want to continue to build my community. I want more readers. I want more followers on Twitter. I want more fans on my Facebook page.
Why? Because I believe that growing my platform can only help me. But I am trying to do it on my terms. I don’t blog like many others do. I check my stats but I don’t focus on continuing to provide content that is derived from keywords.
I don’t spend much time thinking about SEO. Sometimes I wonder if that is a mistake and if it is slowing my progress down. It might be, but at the same time I am trying to hit a specific mark with my writing.
I wrote this for Words Left Unwritten. Some time tomorrow I expect to work it into the main body of the story. I am not sure that I like it, but I feel like it is close. If you don’t want to read that particular post just skip past the text in the block quotes and you’ll see the rest of this one.
I had a dream and you were in it. You were the woman that walked into my life unsought and unexpected. You were the girl that turned my life upside down and inside out.
You found your way into the places that no one else had been and made yourself at home. You were given the rig and the privilege to see what no one else knew. I who had always been unwilling to bare my soul did so gladly and without reservation.
It was among the most shocking moments of my life and something that no one who knew me would have ever expected. The others had seen nothing but glimpses of what lay behind those doors but the moment I felt their eyes upon me I retreated.
I didn’t want it and figured that I didn’t need it.
Easier and better to be the lone wolf. Â There was strength and nobility in my solitude and I liked it that way. Better to be an inscrutable mystery than to open that door and be wounded.
Perhaps it was a sign of immaturity. Perhaps it wasn’t. Ultimately it doesn’t really matter because when you left I shut the door again and threw away the key. When I felt weak or uncertain I composed a list of grievances and set it on fire. It didn’t need to be a raging bonfire because a slow burn was just as effective.
It kept the others out or at least at arm’s length and it allowed me to stay angry with you.
But time has a funny way of playing with people and with the fires we set. Some flames are extinguished and others keep burning.
So it was with the torch I carried for you. The fire never left and the memories never died. Though I did try to rid my mind of them. I worked on trying to convince myself that memory was incongruent with reality and that history was being seen through misty colored memories.
I suppose if we could sing we would have done our own rendition of Streisand and Diamond singing You Don’t Bring Me Flowers Anymore. And maybe for a time that would have been all she wrote. Maybe for a time that would have been all that we could have.
But I have a dream that we are going to find a time and a way to give it another shot. I have a dream that the tears that have been shed and the pain of our separation will end. I have a dream that we are going to get a chance to do it right, except the funny thing is that in many ways I don’t think we did it wrong.
Can’t say what I believe in whether it is meant to be or not. Can tell you that I am sorry that we never got the chance to have those six kids we talked about. Can tell you that there have been moments where I have seen us together in my dreams. And every time I have seen a big house and heard a ton of noise from all of the children running around.
One could be bitter about that or get lost somewhere in the echoes of time but I hear the echoes of the future calling and I think we should answer. The dream I have now gives us decades of life to live and love and to laugh.
I am still here singing our song. I never stopped singing it. If I were a painter I would paint it for you.
There is this big empty hand that is reaching out across time and space. There are are arms that would wrap you in them and a heart calling out for you.
And nestled among the hope there is fear too. There is concern that maybe yesterday is all there is and that we missed out on the time of our life. There is fear that giving the fire free reign might leave my insides with fresh burns long before the scars of the past have had a chance to heal.
Yet that hand remains because the only way to learn whether a fool frolics freely is to dance in the fire and I have been dancing for you for a thousand years now.
In that dream I see you living your life but looking out the window. You are waiting for me to call or come for you. You give me the barest hint of your interest and wait for me to do what you fail to say out loud.
I know the drill. I know the girl who won’t ever say I love you first out loud is there. Air sucker, I know things and I see things. Just remember that though I dance in the fire I still don’t wear a sweater when others are cold.
For now I burn and I ache alone and apart. But the future is unwritten and who is to say what can happen. Submit to possibility and potential and watch what happens.
I see opportunity for more. I see opportunity to improve myself in every area. I see opportunity and I don’t want to watch it float away or see it slip through my fingertips.
Some bloggers only post their finest work because they are afraid that they might lost prospective and existing readers. I don’t worry about that because I can’t. There is no time for it. Some of you will love me. Some of you will hate me and some won’t know what to make of me.
That is natural and it is cool. I build my community around me and I hope that you are a part of it but I understand if you aren’t.
I show you this side, the ratty, seeker who wonders and worries because it is natural. It is me. I am also exceptionally confident and believe wholeheartedly that I am going to get to where I am going. That is part of the joy of life- contradiction.
What I know for certain is that I am in transition. Good old Jack is evolving but I can’t tell you how long this phase will take. All I can say is that I am trying to enjoy the journey and that I smile far more than I frown.
When I struggle with my writing I am going to push through it and hit publish because one of my dreams is to be published. You don’t write a book by only writing when you feel like it. You do it by putting pen to paper and or finger to keyboard. Sit down, shut up and write. Just write. Do that and maybe the universe will give you a straight answer.
As always you are welcome to share my adventure and walk with me on the path into somewhere unknown and unseen. It is 1 AM and I need to sleep.
Jack who never takes himself too seriously has left the building.
