Why the Silence

What is there to say?

The art of unmasking is a challenge for a writer. How hard it is to strip away the layers that create the artifice of my daily life. Even trying to "be real" or "authentic" takes on the veneer of a mask.

I love writing. I love exploring my world through the written word. And yet, blogging is like standing in a crowded park and talking to myself. Writing is the yearning to be known. But what sense am I to make of the fact that while I have given my blog address out to many friends and family – that only a couple still check in on occasion? My own mother who used to read this regularly forgot that I was even doing it. She simply drifted away because what was being said here did not hold her interest. That is my assessment, at any rate. I don't necessarily draw the conclusion that it is my lack of being interesting that has caused that to happen. It doesn't matter how busy the people around me are – living their own complicated lives – what I simply understand is that my yearning to be known; the desire to bring my perspective into the written word so that I can be seen is a futile effort.

Who cares? Beyond me, that is. And why does it matter? Does it matter?

Sometimes it matters. Not a great deal of the time – but there are moments when I move into that needy place of seeking validation outside of myself. There are moments when I want to be sought out – when I want to know that my voice is not only heard but enjoyed. And how strange it is, in those same moments, when it does happen, when I am seen – that I shy away from that focus. I deflect that attention and breathe a sigh of relief when the focus moves away from me. I want and I do not want. What I crave I also fear.

And so I end up in this place of homeostasis. Pulled by needs, stymied by fears – ah life. Is it really different for anyone?

Then what do I do? I end up writing about it. Turns out I had something to say after all.