WHY I BLOG
One evening several years ago, with no forethought that I recall, I sat down and determined to start a blog. Some friends were already blogging and I loved reading their posts. But although I had always enjoyed writing and had taken some writing workshops over the years (and even had a stack of unpublished letters-to-the-editor in my desk), I never had the ambition or the sitzfleisch to pursue a writing life.
Yet that evening the blog title World Thru Brown Eyes came to me in a flash and I resolved to start blogging about things that moved me – childhood memories, family and friends, pleasures and displeasures, favorite books and places, beloved pets, gratifications and regrets – and to write it all with a touch of humor or pathos.
My sister Laurie was in health crisis at the time and I think writing about her then was cathartic in helping me deal with her devastating illness. In fact once I started blogging, the floodgates opened and memories and ideas came pouring out.
So maybe you should try it too and tell us how the world looks through your eyes!
– Dana Susan Lehrman
Dana Susan LehrmanThis retired librarian loves big city bustle and cozy country weekends, friends and family, good books and theatre, movies and jazz, travel, tennis, Yankee baseball, and writing about life as she sees it on her blog World Thru Brown Eyes!
www.WorldThruBrownEyes.com
Dana, it’s interesting what drives us to blog/write. For me, it was retirement, turning 70, and my mother’s death (my father had died a few years earlier) that drove me to blog and then to attempt to write a book. Writing helped me to deal with all of the huge feelings I was experiencing. Now, I also dabble in memoir pieces that I hope will be of interest to my grandkids someday.
Ah yes, there seems to be a common thread leading us to write!
So much warmth (always) and humor (often) in your stories, Dana…I’m glad you’ve chosen to write them!
Thank you Barbara!
Dana, our reasons for writing can overlap and be different. Like you and Laurie, I write to deal with difficult emotions, but also to “keep the sword sharp” for my paid freelance writing and for my poetry.
Lovely to hear you’re a poet Marian, how can I read your poems?
Thanks, Dana, I’ve gotten more serious about my poetry fairly recently, but have submitted a few to a local anthology while I take some workshops. The anthology should be out at the end of the year, and if it becomes available online, I’ll let you know. I am still trying to improve enough to consider publishing. It’s a journey!
Best of luck Marian, keep us posted.
The world could use a few more poets!
Thanks for this post, Dana, nice to learn about your blogging history. I, on the other hand, never would have started writing without Retrospect and its prompts – it would have been too hard for me to figure out what to write about. That’s why, when the founders of Retrospect were going to shut it down, and friends suggested I just start my own blog, I decided instead to buy this site and keep it going. I’m not writing this week because there is no assigned topic.
Then a big thank you Suzy for rescuing MyRetrospect!
Happy writing!
Well, Dana, it looks better through my eyes being able to read stories such as yours.
Thanx Tom for your kind words, and I’m enjoying your stories!
And thanx again to Betsy for the introduction to Retrospect!
Glad you re-posted this, since I missed it the first time around. It seems that blogging for you was a way to deal with your sister’s health crisis, but ultimately, a way to express yourself, as we do here in Retrospect, but you don’t need a prompt. You draw from your life experiences, so brava for you!
Thanx Betsy, and thanx again for bringing me to Retro!
Thanks for reposting. Great to have you contributing now through Retrospect. It seems that there is value in writing down things for our own benefit, and it spills over to the readers as well. Even though it seems a bit like a solitary pursuit, it seems that writing also connects us
Thanx Khati, I enjoy blogging about whatever moves me at the time, but also love writing to our Retro prompts – and often some weeks when I think I don’t have a story for the prompt a memory suddenly bubbles up!
I should get over to your blog more often. You have interesting perspectives, well expressed. In other words, you have way!
Thanx Dave, much appreciate your kind words!