by the Night Writer

Can it really be five years since I cracked the code and put up my first blog post? Yes, indeed, it can be and has.

It feels as if the time has gone by so quickly. As I look back over the archives I’m surprised to see comments from “new” friends that first appeared three, even four, years ago. It’s amazing what has taken place over some 1,589 posts and 4,250 comments (about 85% of which went to my daughters’ posts). Meanwhile my daughters have grown up, posting here and bringing their own verve and attitude and even another contributor! Thanks to blogging, one daughter found herself a husband and we hosted the first (that I know of) live-blog wedding this last May!

I can’t claim anything so dramatic, but I have made a number of dear friends over the years here, some of whom I have yet to meet in person! It would be hard for my family and I to think of what our lives would be like right now if it wasn’t for this wonderful community. I don’t want to get too mushy here, though, because that can start to sound like a foreshadowing for an announcement of quitting. No such plans (or luck, depending on your perspective). While I have cut back a little of late due to other commitments and to putting time into helping Tiger Lilly with her books and writing one of my own, I do miss it on days when I don’t write here. There are no plans, then, to pull the plug here, though there is always a possibility for this blog to change form or focus.

I never set out to be anything in particular with this blog. From the beginning I just wanted to write about things that interested me. The thought of being strictly a political blogger, or a “religious” one, or a “daddy”-blogger would put me off the whole thing entirely, I think. I like to get up in the morning not knowing what I’ll write about that day (if anything), or, for that matter, who I might meet. It’s kind of like not knowing what I’m going to see when I visit my friends’ blogs each day…the variety, with just the right amount of familiarity, keeps it fresh.

Most of all, thank you for reading. People often refer to the “solitary” blogger, but that concept doesn’t work for me. I couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do this if it was just going out into the ether to bounce of Jupiter but not touch anyone else. The feedback and the relationships have been the best parts of all of this. They’ve meant a lot to me, and I hope that on occasion something here has meant something to each of you.

Ever since I reformatted this blog last spring I’ve been trying to tweak some things here. It will likely always be a work in progress, but one of the things I’ve accomplished over the weekend was to create a new page in the header entitled “Nights to Remember”. This has given me the opportunity to go back through the hundreds of posts and select the ones that I thought have been my best, or that generated the most interesting comments, or perhaps gave me a foothold to push off into something deeper. The page is still a work in progress, but there’s a double-handful of posts from 2008-09 there if you’re feeling nostalgic.

So, it’s been a slice…and I expect to take a few more whacks at the apple. Thanks for being along for the ride.

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