2015 had a crappy beginning. My dog Zoey (my son's dog that I inherited to be exact) had become sick sometime during the night all over her room. I had awakened that morning in a foul mood and this discovery didn't help any. I was a middle-age woman stuck in a dead-end job with grown children who were struggling to find their own way in life and a husband who I felt often looked at me and wondered which alien life-form had devoured my soul and was now inhabiting my body. As I shoveled shit all morning, I couldn't help but think how this was a metaphor for my life. I was smack-dab in the middle of a mid-life crisis.
It didn't happen overnight but developed insidiously. My discontent (ok, whining) was verbalized to my husband and friends so often that it had become the butt of jokes at our gatherings. "I'm so unhappy." "What do I want to be when I grow up?" "I don't have any skills." "I'm too old to start a new career.". Wah, Wah, Wah. Don't get me going - especially after a couple of cocktails. I really felt I had a creative side that wasn't being tapped - you know -- the God given talent that your mom always told you was a sin not to utilize. Guilty as charged.
The initial idea of blogging can, in some ways, be credited to my youngest son. He is a senior at a major university studying film and is immersed in the social media world. He blogs, hosts podcasts, interns and edits for a mainstream YouTube channel and has a presence on every social media outlet known to man: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube and many more I suspect he doesn't want me to know about or follow him on. I was ironically attempting to give him career advice on doing something he loves and being able to get paid for it so it wouldn't be "work". Somehow the conversation swung around to me and if I could do anything in the world, what would I love to do. My answer was writing in some form or fashion. My son's response was, "Well, why don't you?" Good question. The usual excuses immediately popped to mind. We have a mortgage. We're paying your way through college and all your expenses associated with college. We want to have enough money so we never have to depend on our children for help. I'm too busy saving the world and so on and so on. But this conversation planted a seed that was watered through subsequent conversations with family members, especially my sister-in-law Becky. She was adamant that I parlay my love of social media, my witty observations (her words not mine, but I'll take it) on people around me and my self-deprecating humour into something. But what?
You guessed it. I am joining the 42 million other people in the world and starting a blog. My plan is to incorporate my love of travel, music, adventure, food, friends and cocktails and hopefully weave these into a few paragraphs that you won't regret losing the ten minutes it took to read. Now, we Southerners have never let the truth get in the way of a good story as Mark Twin said and I have been known to embellish here and there when recounting my adventures (like the time I told my husband I saw an anaconda in our back yard and I swear, I saw an alien spaceship when I was a child), but I promise to give you mostly facts, some good tips on places to visit and hopefully a few chuckles.
Lastly, I always have a soundtrack playing in the back of my brain and a great book on my nightstand. My love of great music and literature can also be attributed to my Southern heritage. So included in my blog will be a song that hopefully will enhance the experience I am relaying and the name of a good book or article I can recommend. One of my goals is to stop the world from reading incredibly bad books that somehow end up on the bestsellers' list. (apparently anybody can write a book these days or a blog for that matter.)
If you have somehow managed to make it to the end of my initial blog, I thank you. Hopefully, together we can see the world with fresh eyes.
My soundtrack. See the World by Gomez
Suggested reading: my blog! (what else?)
Until next time. . . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKJJRnuCwF4
I love your blog. I just found your blog tonight. I saw you advertising it on facebook. I love your writing style as it totally fits your personality....which I have always loved. I read your newest and realized I was witness to one of the weight comments. Who do people think they are to throw out insults. I am glad that you can take them and turn them into unique humor. I will be checking in for some good reading and recommendations. I did go to the music ling of See the World. I don't know why, but it made me very sad. I look forward to ready more of your crazy wit!!!
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