About me (aka The World's Longest Post)

God made me to write.  In my parents' basement, in the Black Hills of South Dakota, there are boxes of purple and yellow (depending on the year and which was my favorite color) notebooks.  The are filled with the large, loopy handwriting of a young girl, fully aware of her destiny, having been called to it at the tender age of seven by Harriet the Spy..

At least I think it was Harriet the Spy.  I've always attributed the quote

"A writer writes.  Always."

to Nanny Golly, but I just Googled it and came up with Throw Mama from the Train, of all things.  Let's just say, instead of me following a rabbit trail around the internet for 30 wasted minutes, that Larry took it from Louise Fitzhugh, who kindly gave it to me.

So.  I started blogging in 2006, when my husband was in Iraq.  A girlfriend, the kind who knows you like the inside of her favorite fleece jacket, had been bugging me to start a blog.  My repeated questions were these:  Who cares what I have to say? Why can't we just talk on the phone?  Her repeated response was this: You'll be surprised at the support network you'll find.  Just give it a try.  When I finally caved, my first post was this dorky attempt to give in without really give in.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Clicker

My great fear is that blogging will be the next automatic garage door opener. In Las Vegas, we never even have to see our neighbors, much less talk to them. We drive up to our houses, click a button, pull into the garage....and then what? Go see if the real estate market is continuing its downward spiral for Bob next door? Check on the visiting grandchildren of Mary across the street? No. We hit that clicker again and close ourselves off from the world. Now, with blogging, I don't have to talk to my friends, I can just read their latest posts. Sure, I know everything that is going on, down to the last detail and complete with color photos, but can we maintain relationships this way? Relationships require effort, work, TIME. Your world is only as big as the people who inhabit it, so my question is this: Will blogging broaden my world, or is it one more step towards automating my life and closing the door behind me as I step through it alone?

Posted by Karen at 10:26pm 

That first post unleashed something in me.  I couldn't stop blogging.  It was therapy in my desert experience.  It got me through my husband's deployment.  I reconnected with college girlfriends.  I made new friends, and I mean the real kind.

I was so addicted that when we left Las Vegas on a month-long sojourn to our new home in Alabama, I started a blog called The Exodus, in which I transcribed each day's events as the children related them to me.  Hilarious.

Both of these blogs, White Walls Forever: The Life of an Air Force Wife, and The Exodus, were not really for public consumption.  In 2009, I decided to start another blog that would, I imagined, detail my Walk.  The web address is karen-bloggingforjesus@blogspot.com, and after sixteen or so attempts, I titled it Running the Race (from Hebrews 12).

It's kind of stinky.

Ok.  It might be really stinky.

The problems are these:  In the other blogs, I had written to my girlfriends, in my Girlfriend Voice.  In this one, I didn't know who I was writing to, or what voice I should use.  When I wanted to post about what I'd read in my Bible, or what I'd learned in a sermon, I doubted, not my theology, but rather my ability to share that theology.  And then.  Then there were the days when I didn't feel theological.  There were the days that I fought with my husband, yelled at my children, whined, complained, grumbled, cried.  Which left me wondering, What do you write on a Jesus blog when you aren't feeling particularly close to Jesus?  So I wouldn't write anything.  Which left me wondering, Do I look like some weird perfect Jesus girl because I only write about the times I feel close to Jesus?

It was torture.

It was always with me, whether I wrote or didn't, and I was rarely happy with it.

So.  Here we are.  Blogger has graciously added Pages to its format (which seem more like Tabs to me, but whatever), and has thereby inspired me to start yet another blog.  A blog for public consumption.  Written in my Girlfriend Voice.  With Tabs for my various and sundry moods.

I promise that I will not (always) write this much in one post.  You have my word.