I Don't Know What I Think Until I Read What I Say

Yesterday I decided that I was going to purge some stuff.  That's why there was no blog post, I was knee deep in Christmas stuff, middle and high school stuff and all the half empty bottles of goo from under my bathroom sink.  It was a very productive day and I cleaned out a lot of crap.  I'm kinda sad I'm done. I'm thinking about tackling PJ's room next.  There is something about getting rid of stuff you don't need that is almost like therapy.

Anyway, as I was going through the three boxes of crap that I had from middle school and high school, plus the million cards that I had from PJ's baby shower and birthdays and whatever other holidays were mixed in, I realized a couple of things. The first is that I save too much crap.  The second is that I used to write all of the time.

When I started this blog I couldn't figure out why I didn't start writing a blog sooner than I did.  What I didn't remember is how much I used to write.  I found entire notebooks of original poetry, song lyrics that I wanted to remember, quotes.  I forget that I actually had a poem published in an anthology of poetry.

I found about six journals spanning from 6th grade to 12th grade.  Reading them is embarrassing, even to me, the person that wrote them.  I think that somehow as we get older we block out the awfulness that is adolescence.  There were definitely some funny things and some interesting things.  But I had to stop reading, I just couldn't bring myself to go back there.  I saved them though, I'm sure someday I'll want to remember what it was like to be 14, but that day is not today.  

I talk about getting rid of stuff as being like therapy, writing is so much more therapeutic than anything else I do. The point is that when I was younger, I understood that there was a writer inside of me.  Whether she is a good one or not doesn't matter. What matters is that somehow, along the way, I managed to lose that writer and I am so happy and thankful that somehow I found her again.

When I sit down everyday to write my blog I don't do it because I want to.  I do it because I have to.  I sit down and write because I don't know how I feel or what I think about something until I put it down on paper.  Until I can read my thoughts and work through them in black and white, with the sound of the keyboard and radio lulling me into a sort of trance that helps my brain sort through my shit.  For some reason, other people like to read through my thought processes, which is amazing to me, and a little odd.

And now, a little taste of the poetry I used to write :-)  Judging by the handwriting, I would guess that I was in middle school when I wrote this poem.  Probably 8th grade. Even in my adolescent angst I knew that my mom was magic and amazing and probably knew a whole lot more than what I was telling her.

The Things They Know....

We hide things from them 

thinking that we're sly.

Doing things we'd never do

beneath our mother's eye.

We cheat, we smoke, we curse, we lie

Swearing one day we'll tell them of our lives.

They'll look at us and grin

sharing motherly glances

Then suddenly they'll burst out laughing

shocking all our senses.

You think we didn't know those things?

You think they're a surprise?

We were once young too you know?

We know about your minds