Why (not) start again?

 

For the past 4 years I've been writing mostly in this group of files I collectively call "Dad's Book For You". It was born out of an idea I got when working in Lancaster at CTY, a summer camp for gifted kids. During our nightly meetings before lights out, my fellow RA, Andrew, and I would talk to the kids about the announcements for the next day. But while all the other RAs were doing the same with their kids, we kinda realized that this was a lost opportunity to impart some wisdom. So, we came up with the idea of doing what we called "Life Lessons" during our meetings - simple tidbits of wisdom that we'd gleaned along the way in life, which ranged from how to make friends to how to deal with personal hygiene. We made it fun and educational at the same time, and the kids really enjoyed it.

Several years later I found myself wanting to create the same concept for my future children, so I started writing once a week or so, chronicling my life and putting down thoughts along the way, which led to me no longer posting in this blog. But, as life would have it, we never had human kids, and although the kids we have now are lovely and adorable and we're totally content with how things ended up, I figured that perhaps I'd give the "Dad's Book" project a rest for a while and get back to blogging.

"B-b-b-b-but it's 2022!" you say.

Yes. Yes it is. 

However, when I think about the best writing of my life, it wasn't what I wrote in college or high school or the stuff I put in my little book for the children I never had (to be honest, I was kinda dissappointed with the content overall...too much of the mundane: "I went to work this week. I ate pizza this Saturday. My back hurts." It felt like I was writing logs as captain of the famed starship U.S.S. Mid-30s-Work-5-Days-A-Week-Try-Not-To-Get-Too-Fat). 

The best writing I ever did was in this blog. I come back to it every few years and laugh my ass off at some of the shit I wrote. Some of the writing, especially in the beginning, is needlessly and awkwardly worded, but eventually I fell into a groove at some point that helped me produce stuff that I'm still happy to reread all these years later, so I figured why not give it a shot again. 

And as far as the kids go, I'm sure they won't mind (as long as I give them some treats).