Qualified Refinement

So I really have no idea exactly what I’m going for here. As a fair warning, I am liable to go on serious tangents, mix up three ideas within one paragraph, or in other ways fail to make my point clear or interesting. It’s been awhile since I’ve tried to keep up with writing on my own terms on a regular basis, probably because when I first started out I didn’t have to try. I was a disenfranchised and bored eighth grader who could wildly exceed the expectations of his audience by insulting middle school authority and spelling most things correctly.

I don’t think I genuinely regret letting writing fall by the wayside as that motivation faded over the years. I just plain didn’t feel like doing it, and there were plenty of other things I didn’t feel like doing that were far determinant of my immediate future than trying to think of something good to put on my Livejournal. But now, though perhaps the unavoidable drive to write hasn’t reemerged, I care enough to force myself to see what’s possible.

My grandfather wrote a novel, probably around five years ago, loosely based on his experiences farming outside Sacramento as a young man. Having heard that I was looking at my mom’s copy, my grandpa got me my own for my 20th birthday. Inside the cover, he wrote, “I wish now that I had kept a diary or semi-diary and urge you to do so. There are some gaps in my life now and it would be wonderful to refine those times.”

His note has been resonating with me, especially after moving into my first real apartment, and finding the whole tone of college life shifting. Even if there will inevitably be countless pictures and artifacts from all these years, there are so many feelings and impressions that aren’t captured in all this evidence of my existence. If anything, I’m back writing again for myself. I don’t really know how you, the reader, fall into this. But I didn’t worry about you that much six or seven years ago when I started mashing the keys about wanting to get out of middle school. So I have a feeling the less I worry about you right now, the better. Fair warning.