Taking a breather.

My post Such beautiful boys about Keith and Kevin kinda took it out of me.  In a good way, but I've been a little emotionally exhausted since I wrote it.  I know I have a lot more to say about Keith and Kevin, and I will continue to write about them and my brother Philip and the rest of my family in future posts.  But today I am spent and I have been thinking more about the process of writing and why I write.


I don't really think about the words I'm going to write until I open the template for a new post; I usually just have some photos in mind, and maybe a topic.  I guess I build the words around the photos and the images in my mind.  I like writing this way, because I doesn't give me the chance to over think what I want to say.  I also don't give myself a lot of time to edit or re-work my writing.  Each post takes me between 15 minutes and an hour to complete.  Unsurprisingly, Such beautiful boys took the longest at almost two hours.  But most of that time is spent thinking and uploading photos, not writing; I try to get it out onto the screen as quickly as possible, to stay true to my train of thought at that very moment.  Because of that, I inevitably think back and wish I'd added something here and there: an overlooked anecdote, a photo, a description, a memory.  But this is just ego.  I do go back and read my posts and I am proud of them, because they stand perfectly well on their own, just as they are.  


I've really enjoyed writing this blog and I'm pleased that others have enjoyed reading it (this is also just ego, but I digress).  I've always thought of writing something more substantial, but knowing that the best place to start is to "write what you know" has always stopped me in my tracks.  Write what I know??  Who would possibly want to read about my life, even fictionalized?  Just the thought of it made me yawn.  Well, in writing this blog, I've come face-to-face with my own life and realized that my stories are everyone's stories: they are readable because they are relatable.  Who would have thought.


I have at least ten or twelve topics taking shape in my mind and I'm looking forward to writing them.  I hope you'll enjoy reading them too.


And for no reason at all, here at six photos taken on two separate days: three each of Haven and Sonja wearing the same hat.