This is an exercise in trying to finish something – to shake a decades long burden off my back by actually doing the thing that I think about and plan about far too much. In short, I’ve been trying to write a book for over fifteen years and it’s been an amazing process but it’s time to get it done, and publishing here on this site is an effort to do two things: help me to actually finish my book and to share some of the other thoughts that have been kicking around my head for so many years.
If you don’t know me, just read a few posts and you’ll probably learn a few things. The basics are that I’m a father pushing fifty who works a good job in the public service that has earned me a good wage and has enabled me and my family to live a pretty comfortable life in Toronto. It’s been good and I’m thankful for that. It was a roundabout journey to this job and it was not the journey I envisioned when I was a younger man. It was not what I dreamed of doing with my life – the taking care of a family part…yes. The things I actually do…no, not really. I work with good people and I certainly could have done a lot worse. I haven’t sold my soul or anything.
But the things I did dream about doing with my life when I was younger, well, they have stayed with me, and I’m not ready to completely grieve them, although I think that in some ways there has been a process of grieving each year that I haven’t moved any closer to doing something.
So, this is me doing something, which hopefully will also help me to finish the other thing I’ve been working on in fits and starts for the last decade and a half.
Doing this makes me feel anxious. I got the blog set up for posting months ago and promptly set it aside. I made a plan to write and post at the beginning of the year and promptly abandoned it. It makes me feel badly, but despite all my challenges, which at various times I think are rather severe and other times nothing special, I’m going to make a go of it. The challenge will be to stick with it. So maybe if I actually post this, and then tell people I’ve posted this and that I’m planning to post more it will keep me on track.
One more thing. I’m also a Christian. This is something I think about a lot and I plan to write about a lot as well. It’s probably the one thing I want to write about more than anything. A person being a Christian might bring up negative feelings for you and because I’m very aware of that reality I often try to explain my Christianity with an apologetic explanation about why I think I probably don’t embody or represent the things that make you sad or angry or hurt, but it’s hard and it gets awkward, and what do I know about your negative experiences with Christianity? So, I won’t explain here, I’ll just make my apology short. If for some reason you have had a bad experience with Christianity or with Christians, I’m really sorry about that. I don’t understand a lot of things about my faith and the fact that I have kept it is one of the things that I find amazing. Jesus tells a story about a man who finds a treasure buried in a field and sells everything he has to buy the field. I feel like that is a good description of my faith. What is the treasure? What does it bring me? What do I do with it now that I have purchased this field in which it is buried? In many ways I feel as if it is still buried and I do not fully know the extent of it or even what it really is, but I believe with all my heart that it is there and that faith within me gives me something that is worth everything. So, when I think about this treasure I have and then I think about all the embarrassing and awful things that have been done in Jesus’ name by Christians throughout history I feel conflicted and confused. I want to understand this juxtaposition and I also hope that somehow I can be an influence to move the balance back towards the good that is supposed to shine from this treasure we believe in.
So, I think that’s enough if you’re curious. I don’t like that my writing style is rambling and tentative and that’s partly why I don’t share things and why it takes me so long to finish things. Writing, rewriting, thinking, editing, rewriting and so on. But, for the sake of the reason why I’m doing this I’m just going to write things and publish them. I’m not going to let myself take days to finish them because in many cases they won’t get finished and I will feel despair. I’ve been told at many times not to apologize for my words or for my work, but I’m going to ignore it. I want you to know that if you think my writing is unpolished and rough, I think so too. But that’s okay, my voice is here and that’s the point after all.