My First Adult Think-Aloud

Is it acceptable to be your own inspiration? I don’t know if this is too egoistical to admit, but I really get off on reading my own writing. I brag about what I’ve written on this blog a lot...primarily to myself, but I really do believe every word I say (it’s witty, it’s incisive, it’s relevant, etc. etc.). And while I’ve been meaning to jump back on the horse and blog regularly again, I wasn’t quite sure when to go about it until I read an article in a back issue of The Washington Post Magazine in which Terry M. Shine delivers a self-deprecating, funny, and painfully honest narrative of being laid off (“Terminated”, May 25, 2008). What really reached me about the piece was...how much it reminded me of my own writing. (Surprised? Or just disgusted?) So voila, here I am again, trying to recover my voice and make it simultaneously louder and more mellifluous.

Erm...so...like anybody trying to be brought back into the fold, I suppose I’m a little bit rusty, not to mention lost about what or whom to commentate on. I’m not feeling particularly witty, incisive, or relevant right now, and I’m anxious to know what I’ll be doing to get over that feeling. It’s been about a year since my last entry, and in rereading my previous pieces I’m reminded that that was the time when I pretty much had the Phillies, and only the Phillies, on the brain. Now I’m not quite so single-minded, but that comes with its own difficulties when it comes to blogging...how do I tackle a year’s worth of developments in a sitting? Do I even try? Or do I just start anew?

I’ve got another year until grad school, and so far, no plans for the year. Tentative plans, but that doesn’t really mean anything. The only thing I knew I wanted to do in this interim year was to write, and write a lot. And even though that has been my only sure thought, I know I’ve already lost sight of that at times; I’m also looking for a job, trying to figure out how to parse out my summer salary from Teach For America (of which I have one more paycheck), wondering how long I can go unemployed and still pay the bills. Maybe I need to become single-minded again - and this time, not about baseball.

Check in to see how it goes. If it's an incentive, I probably won't be so egoistical and self-assured. At least for a little while.