What Once Was...

Ever since I stumbled through something of a freedom of speech issue in the Spring I've found it difficult to type here.  Ideas fall flat, stifled by prudence or caution, and the freedom that comes with expressing yourself can now, at times, feel oppressive...it can feel more like filtering than finding truth, and it's been a frustrating and sometimes painful process. I've never been without words and too often here I find myself searching for the right ones. Fortunately for me, this is one relationship that I'm not ready to shy away from. It's been such a sturdy post to lean on for so long that I wouldn't know which way was up if it weren't here to fiddle with...or even to just consider. Still, I had no idea how hard it would be once my eyes were opened wide to the ways that we can be filtered.

I write about situations almost constantly...most will never see the light of day, not now. I was always careful to exclude accurate details, and always aware of the impact of my words. I was cautious, but honest, and when I lost that, it made things difficult. I've never been very good at separating the two versions of me...work, home....probably because there aren't two versions. There's just one of me, and that's the one that everyone gets.  It felt like having a part of me cut off.  Strangely, the words have never come more easily...it's just that now they have no audience...no place to go, but still I write them...almost every day. I have to put them somewhere.  In losing the ability to put them here I lost a giant part of my ability to just let the situations go...to move on from the stories and from the feelings that they inspired, and let go of the burdens they too often left me with. Now I find I carry that all around with me. It's exhausting...and frustrating.  For so long I had you, and now I have an overflowing shed full of thoughts and emotions and beliefs, all piled at odd angles, unsafely, seemingly ready to topple. I suspect that I will someday start putting all of those things here again, and very likely soon, but it's been a challenge beyond what I expected. I think of Robert Hunter's elegy for a sadly departed Jerry Garcia<\a> and the sentiments ring true..."Now that the singer is gone where do I go for the song?"

Expect a return to the old...if I were a gambling man I'd lay good money down that the time is now for those stories and feelings to find their way back here to these pages.  After all, this was partly a document so that my daughters would someday know, beyond any shadow of doubt, who their father was...it still is.