Ten-Finger Exercises

Before Love Or Glory

Blogging, to me, is an exercise in doing something I always said I should do and am now trying to find a way to do that is fun and entertaining, at least to me if not to anyone else.

I have always thought I should keep a journal. From time to time I have done so. I have journaled my dreams and also my rants. I have told myself I should record such mundane things as when I planted tomatoes that year, and when the first red fruit was ready for picking. I always forgot.

Yes, it was interesting to read the dream journals over, to see the same themes of houses not quite moved into with marvelous hidden rooms. Bodies of water at first not crossed were then finally spanned. The car themes always were there too. There were cars that just wouldn’t go, ones that I tried to drive from the right hand seat or the back, ones with flashing warning lights.

That isn’t blogging material though.

I’m still in the process of identifying what is blogging material.

When I was young, the grandparents we lived with would pack up their Airstream about October and come back around the first of March. Then for the summer they’d pack off to the lake cottage near Akron. My grandmother wrote postcards, at least once a week, usually just the penny variety rather than picture cards. I can see her broad, angular writing clearly in my mind, with the slight blob of ink from the ballpoint pen. The content usually went like this: “It’s been nice and sunny here. Hope you folks aren’t getting too much snow. Saw the Rodaheavers last week. Florence sure looks good, but Ben don’t. Fried up some fish, and had a nice mess of greens to go with it. Was going to bake a cake but forgot I don’t have the right pans along. Well, that’s all for now. Loads of love, Mother and Dad.”

Blogging about the day’s meals wouldn’t be very interesting. Still, my style feels a little like I’m writing to people I know, whether or not they’re reading.

Ranting about my frustrations, like today’s blog, isn’t very interesting reading either.

So, blogging is not just about writing something of interest to others. It is sometimes about putting a situation or feelings in print, to help define the problem or vent about it.

For me the most important thing is a commitment to writing daily, and to noticing consciously the world about me as well as my inner world. You could call it looking for fodder for the blog; but in a greater sense it is awareness, and that’s a large part of being present to God in my life.

Before Love Or Glory comes awareness; and awareness is the work of the great I AM within.