The concept of blogging and adopting the idea that anyone should have any interest in my commentary is foreign to me. I have consistently found this idea not only narcissistic, but truly selfish. Many years ago a friend of mine had lost a substantial amount of weight and when I asked her how she had done so she replied simply, "I ran constantly". That obvious notion had worked.
I have been a recreational writer my entire life and I recognize that in order to truly make progress in my writing I must, in effect, "write constantly", and so I am accepting the notion of blogging. I suppose too that this will be the place where I will safely stumble upon and discover, however ungracefully, the unfortunate pitfalls and realities of sharing one's writing.
It is not my intent to chronicle my daily activities, or to share my political, religious or social affiliations with any regularity. I do not propose to offer my observations on life in anyway with the intent to sway the beliefs, attitudes or values of others. Rather, I hope to modestly showcase my passion for and ability to conceive, arrange, and offer the written word in such a way that inspires and provokes imagery and thought.
I can faintly hear friends, coworkers, ex-boyfriends and the like collectively holding their breath hoping that they or any resemblances of them will not appear in any of these musings and to that end I can only offer the following. This blog has at its core a business intention. And while Six Flags hopes that you will leave its gates happy and satisfied I presume, it nonetheless had an agenda when it lured you with its initial marketing collateral. The intention is to entice you to use its services, for you to share your experiences with your friends, and return again. Welcome to my version of the great American amusement park; please come again!
Living in San Francisco for over a decade I had the good fortune to develop my scuba diving skills in the Monterey Bay. There is a theory in scuba diving that when you become disoriented in the deep water and no longer know which direction will lead you to the water's surface you should exhale a small amount of air and just follow the bubbles. Writing is a complex and vast space and being a writer with much to say and few venues in which to say it, is a disorienting experience.
I have known since childhood that I love to write and that I am as happy to write technical papers as I am short stories, resumes as I am product tags. I have turned warehouse workers' job histories given to me-and this is a true story- on napkins into resumes fit for IT executives and written product tags for flamingos made in China that would make you want to sit with them in the finest Zen garden and find your concept of God beside them. I have had nearly two decades of a sales career that has spanned both coasts and I have sold medical software to hospitals and hotel rooms to hockey teams. Throughout every venue I have written - written well, written powerfully, written persuasively. It is time to write permanently.
When I was a child my cousin and I would ride along with our grandfather on his route delivering fruit and vegetables from his garden to wealthy customers in New York and Connecticut. On one outing we were riding in the back of his orange box truck that was more than spacious for two little girls to run up and down the aisle when a light wooden basket of assorted tools, screws, pens, and a variety of other things he felt he needed for a successful day's work, fell from a top shelf and crashed to the floor. While at first frightened, we ultimately thought this was hysterical and for the rest of the day we positioned it, unbeknownst to our grandfather, on the edge of the shelf so that as he would hit potholes it would fall several more times. Each time, we would pretend to be scared, but then laugh to each other. He would get frustrated because those items that to us seemed useless, were to him very important resources.
I am again at a place where I am staring at a basket of resources and tools scattered out in front of me, but now I too recognize that they are in fact very useful indeed and lend themselves to a successful day's work. They are the tools I have assembled through my career in writing, in sales, by writing thousands of letters, product tags, resumes, catalogs, reports and presentations. It is time to put all of them into a basket and go to work. It's my turn to deliver the fruits of my labor to customers.
When faced with any level of vastness in front of you, as in diving, the best and most basic solution is to exhale and simply...follow the bubbles and they will lead you to the open air and you will breathe. So, I will begin with this blog, and just "write constantly".
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