Do You Still Want To Stick Around

While perusing blogs this morning, I came across this. Not only did it send me into a fit of well-needed giggles. It reminded me of why I invest the time that I do in reading blogs. Blogs, especially those written by witty, self-deprecating, strong, passionate, honest, articulate, women, make me happy.

This got me thinking about my own blog. I started re-reading what I'd written the past few days. I realized that things are boring around here. They are also depressing. I want to be one of those witty, wonderful, women bloggers. (I was, apparently, also just dying to use alliteration.) I want to be a bright spot in the day of my readers. I want to be the blog that forces you all to go out and buy those adult diapers called Depends. I want you to be laughing so hard that you go on and wet yourself. Yes. That is it. I want Ordinary Art to be so funny that I have to put a disclaimer here stating that just reading my words may cause bladder leakage. Ordinary Art, the blog dedicated to ruining perfectly good pairs of panties around the globe. This is my dream.

The problem with this is that even if I was as funny as I imagined myself to be and your ability to kegel was as weak as I hope it to be, sometimes there is just no joke to be found. Sometimes the total sum of what I am going through is not in any way, funny. No matter how hard I try to stretch the shape of things, hurt persists. And, writing helps.

I have always found writing cathartic. Even as a child, stashing away my little pink diary and furtively hiding the small gold-key, I wrote to make sense of my place in the world. I'm still trying to do that. The difference is that then, the only audience I had was me. Now? Having an audience can be empowering and validating.

I'm awed by the fact that there are people who take time out of their day to read my words, to leave a comment, to add me to their blogroll (the heart swoons. Truly it does) There are actually people out there who view me as someone worthy of being read. Someone. Worthy. Me. The over-weight, awkward, school-girl that is always lying quietly inside this loud-mouth blogger's body thanks you for this little act of linky love (there I go with that alliteration again.) Yes.

Having an audience can be empowering and validating. It also carriers more responsibility than writing privately does. I know that there are people in my life, important people, who read this blog. I know that this blog is going to be archived on the Internet, forever. This blog is a permanent record of what I have said, what I have done, who I am. Looking at it this way makes me never want to write again. But, I need to write.

I need this space to be my own, even if it is not always sunny. Even if you vehemently diagree with what I say. I need this to be real.

So, if you are looking for butterflies and puppies, you better move along. If you don't mind a chubby, insecure, overly-emotional, grammatically-challenged, control-freak, sometimes funny, mostly disheveled Mommy of two, who is just trying to work it all out and happens to be using this blog as free therapy, well then…

this is certainly the place for you.