Today I've decided I would blog for the first time

So I'm sitting at the couch with my husband last night, sharing our reviews of the movie Juno and discussing the fact that the screenplay from that movie all started with a writer's blog about her life. This lucky writer caught someone important's eye and that someone asked her to turn her innocent blog into a screenplay which turned into a hit movie screenplay. I knew where this casual conversation with my husband was going. It only had one place to go. At least coming from my husband who has the discipline of a navy seal for all aspects of his life...triathlon training, preparing for a licensing exam, doing research on buying a house. He approaches everything with the precision and dedication of an experienced surgeon and expects all around him (especially me) to do the same. Lucky me. Oh, the pressure.

"Andre," he asks, "why don't you start blogging?" What my husband really wants to say is, "Can you put SOMETHING down on paper, considering it took all of ten years and thousands of dollars to get your degrees in writing and you haven't wanted to put a pen to paper SINCE!" Carlos has tried everything to get me to write again, everything ranging from dooming my life to failure for not taking advantage of what was either talent or a skill I had spent a considerable amount of time honing to getting all flowery with me about how much he enjoys reading my works and missing them oh so much. His first tactic elicits sheer rage in me to the point where I am literally biting the side of my tongue to hold me back from spewing vicious tirades at him about how it's none of his business and why does it matter to him anyway and that I'll do whatever I want with my life (sometimes the tongue biting doesn't work). His second tactic brings about another sentiment in me: remorse and incompetence. Either way, I feel the same way some time after his remarks. Guilt over not possessing the discipline it takes to just sit at the computer and stop finding excuses to just go ahead and do it: write. Sadness that I've let so much time pass in between obtaining my degree and the moment when my thesis advisors told me I really had potential to make my works publishable and actually doing something about it. And anger for not doing anything tangible towards one of the things I told myself I would do before I die: get my thesis published.

So anyway, this was supposed to be a blog about just that: blogging for the first time. But in essence, it is. Here I am blogging for the first time, absorbing myself in this new world of putting thoughts to paper. More importantly though, I guess I've realized why people enjoy doing this so much. After all is said and done, this ends up being a mechanism enabling us to explore what's really on our minds. And it's often more than: Hey, look at me, I'm blogging!