Every now and then I ask myself why I maintain my blog. The answer is, despite public opinion, not because of the throngs of adoring fans that my “popular blog” inevitably drives to my doorstep. Instead, it is purely selfish in nature. I write because I enjoy writing and want people to enjoy reading my thoughts. However, if people didn’t read my blog I’d still write.
I have found that through the process of writing I have become a more dexterous writer and speaker and overly more articulate. Part of this comes from the process in which I write. I have never been the write/proof/revise/repeat type of writer. Quite frankly, that bores the hell out of me. I have always been the type that spews my thoughts onto the screen, proof reads once to make sure it makes sense, then hits the publish button. As part of this process words pop into my head and my mind screams, “This is the perfect word for this sentence. Use it! Use It! Use it!”. Sometimes I know the word but more often than not it is a word that I have no idea what it means and even less idea where I heard it. So I look it up. About 50% of the time (a surprisingly high amount) the word is just right for the sentence and I use it. Other times it doesn’t fit at all and I note it for future use. I can’t think of an example word but if you see a word in one of my posts that you don’t hear very often it is a good bet it falls into this category.
In addition to the McDonaldLand groupies, I maintain this blog because it is a stress reliever. Most of my posts I write in a disjointed nature, adding a line or two when waiting for a meeting to start or some other small and otherwise useless time. In fact, two of the posts (to be released later this week) were almost complete and I had just forgotten about them. Because I tap away at the posts in this fashion it often gives me a mental break from the tasks at hand, allowing my “batteries” to recharge.
Finally, I write because I like to create stuff. This is the same reason I became a programmer. This is the same reason I am an avid woodturner. Writing is just a different medium.
