Gratitude

John McCain-like, I refused to acknowledge you on Friday and Saturday, after a few very lame pseudo-entries last week. And in surreal fashion, I'm not even sure whom I'm addressing right now: The blog itself? My readers? My own conscience? All of the above?

I think I'm back now, though, and there are a few very concrete reasons why. They are the same reasons that have made this the only successful experiment in discipline and continuity--or the only one that has brought me such happiness--in my life thus far.

I'll be honest. There have been many, many days when I have forced myself to write here because of my pledge to myself and signed off convinced that this was, indeed, an exercise in futility. Not futile in that I was actually writing, but futile in its grim march onward in spite of lack of inspiration. It is counter to my personality, my belief system, to make myself do things for the sake of doing them. And there have been weeks at a time when I was writing so fluidly, so productively, that it never occurred to me to compare this blog to a diet or a gym regimen. But then there have been the dark days, or rather nights, when I have waited--in my old familiar style--until the very last possible minute and then forced myself to type, not write, something--just so I could say that I had done it.

I started this blog as an experiment, as a framework for me in which to find my voice and stride again. I didn't tell many people about it, but the ones I did tell were people whose opinion, whose feedback, matters most profoundly to me, in so many different ways. Some of you are writers, and I crave your feedback on the writing itself. Others of you are people who know me very well and love me anyway, and I crave your support and encouragement. Some of you are both.

Some people, to my surprise, have come to read this blog thanks to a friend or relative of mine, or because they saw a link on Facebook and have known me at some point over the course of my life and found themselves mildly curious. Your responses--the fact I know you are reading, too--has also kept me going. I find myself daily marveling at the fact that the circumstances of my life have led to me form some kind of a connection with so many fascinating, brilliant, thoughtful, insightful people doing so many wonderful things. The very occasional nasty comments tend to elicit an immediate outraged response by someone feeling protective of me, which so totally more than negates the momentary pang at the nastiness.

I am not actually writing this for you, at heart, however. I am still doing it for me, in spite of my increasingly appreciative relationship to your feedback. But your comments--gracious, reassuring, wondering, defensive on my behalf, and yes, praising--make the enterprise worthwhile. You are why I keep going, why I am reminded every single morning that writing is a conversation and that I need to be worthy of the dialogue, that attention of the right kind is why we wake up and push through every day, that I am fortunate beyond compare in friends and family regardless of anything else that is happening in my life or in the world.

I won't do this again. Or maybe I will--one unequivocal aspect of the blog is that it is uncharted territory. But I kind of think I won't. So just this once, as I ease back in from my quicksand episode, I will say what I have wanted to say to so many of you for 248 days now.

Thank you.