Here I am again, copying someone’s neat blog post idea. This one on Flotsam was written to mark her five-year blog-o-versary wherein she ponders what else she’s been doing for the last five years.
I’ve been blogging at Standing in the Shadows for almost exactly fifteen months (I did mark my one-year blog-o-versary). As I wrote about at the one-year mark and was just thinking about again recently, I have seen through the blog and through the rest of what I work on as a writer that my interests aren’t completely laser-focus sharp.
In fact, just this past weekend, I went to an event—Dish+Dine, a terrific series that Ferrin Gallery has put together—in which the artist speaking was potter Mark Shapiro, someone I’ve written about before. I’ve also interviewed his wife, writer Pamela Thompson. I ended up interviewing her because we met at a family pick-up soccer game and I learned she was a writer with her first novel about to be published. The book sounded interesting and I queried Mamazine (sadly, it’s no longer publishing) and was able to do the interview for that publication. So, upon seeing both her and Mark—and then going on to see a production directed by another person I’ve written about recently (for Preview Massachusetts magazine, not online), Pauline Productions’ Jeannine Haas, I started to think about how my writer work kind of takes place like so: I’m a spider web and the stories get caught in the strands for me to examine. By the way, the production of Scaramouche Jones (also running this Thursday, Friday and Saturday at Three Sisters Sanctuary in Goshen) is absolutely riveting.
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From Flotsam: But back to the point: five years. Sixty months. Where has the time gone? What have I done with it? A lot happens in five years. I’ll just follow suit. Some of my answers are in response to the Flotsam list; others I’ve made up because they pertain more closely to my five years.
Here we go:
Live babies acquired: 1, Anxious months between baby’s birth and adoption being formalized: 7 Books written: 0 (Degrees acquired: 0 (unless you count Gyrotonic teacher training) Strollers owned: 2 Plants felled by disease/neglect: in the neighborhood of 25 indoors and out (not counting two trees, not our fault) (Days admitted to hospital: 0 (fortunately), Literary rejections received: handful Non-literary rejections received: more than a handful Schools kids will have been in by September: 5 Schools kids will be in starting in September: 4 Parent/teacher conferences: about 32 Forms for school or camp or adoption agency filled out, television hours consumed, friends made (real and virtual), perspective granted, and storms weathered: all too great to measure with current technology.
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How does a random list of things that occurred over five years mesh with blogging? I think it’s like this: when we write consistently (and put ourselves “out there”), we create a kind of road map of past travels—here’s what was on my mind then, and here’s what was on my mind then—and when we look back, more is revealed than the list or the specific posts. Patterns emerge. The terrain rises up, almost. There’s something very interesting about how the blogosphere has become so well mapped, charting so much terrain. To that end, I’m glad to be a copycat every now and then, and increasingly glad to participate in the giant mapping project.
