A Beginning

There are a few people within my social orbit who have encouraged me to write a book. This encouragement is flattering but such a prospect feels daunting for several reasons:

• What would I write about? I possess a little bit of knowledge about a limited number of topics but I have a thorough knowledge of very few. And I do not see myself as an expert of any. The book, therefore, would be very short. Or discordant. Or both. It would take but a few paragraphs to exhaust the limits of my knowledge and the ruse of my brilliance would soon be revealed as a mere facade. Can I really put myself in the position where I grant unfettered access to the flawed and faulty architecture of who I am?

• Who would be interested? Beyond a few family members and some select friends, I see a limited market for the explication of the thoughts and ideas bouncing around inside my head. That statement, I suppose, is only a thin veneer for the darkness of my pride and arrogance. My pride and arrogance demand that I am heard and known by larger audience. It takes much work to keep the inner tyrant of ego in check. (Maybe “inner-tyrant-crybaby-ego” is more accurate.)

• I think the above two reasons may be borne out of an unhealthy insecurity. Perhaps I need to set that all aside, put my man-pants on and dive in. (Or should it be: “take my man-pants off and dive in”? The former would be reminiscent of my lifeguard training days during which I was occasionally required to don all my clothing, jump into the swimming pool, and perform a simulated rescue of a classmate feigning distress. You see, this is what happens when one mixes metaphors. Confusion. “Diving-in” and “putting-pants-on” — they should mix only in a limited set of circumstances.)

• I am lazy. It isn’t the type of laziness that sits around and binges on Netflix while the laundry and the dishes stack up, though there are times when I am that type of lazy. (But never so lazy that the dishes and the laundry stack up in the same pile.) It is the type of laziness that always has something more important to do. Something more emergent. Something more pressing. Something more interesting or something more necessary. It is a type of laziness that is quite cunning. It is the type of laziness that has a lengthy checklist: it promptly checks off the easy tasks, adds accomplished items not originally placed on that list and checks those off, and then relegates the unaccomplished tasks to the morrow’s list. Consistently. Everyday. Until it is 2020 and the goals and dreams and aspirations of 1999 remain unaccomplished.

This is a blog. It is not a book. But it is the beginning of me sharing the thoughts and ideas bouncing around inside my head. As such, perhaps it will provide satiating scraps for the wolves of my aspirations, thereby distracting them long enough to put my pants on and jump in the pool.