I am laughing as I write... I have spent the last hour+ trying to customize the "classic" blogger template so that it will have a distinctive look rather than appear identical to any number of other blogs using this template. Only moments ago, did I realize that here I was trying to make the blog special and unique! There is NOTHING WRONG with that, with expressing one's individuality and preferences, e.g., giving something like a blog its unique flavor. It just made me chuckle to notice how hard I was working at doing that when, in fact, I like this template, and it is much easier to use as is than to modify a great deal. Ah, EASE! Ease is another characteristic related to being nobody special. All too often ( without me even being aware of it), trying to be somebody special calls forth my perfectionism—not a good friend to bring to all my endeavors, especially to writing. I think it was Natalie Goldberg in either her book, Writing Down the Bones: Freeing The Writer Within or in Wild Mind, who suggested writing lousy on purpose, sitting down and intending to write the worst junk in America. In this blog, I will not be trying to write junk. But neither will I be efforting to write something noteworthy thereby running the risk of the Voracious Perfectionist devouring a post on its way to cyberspace. There can be great joy in crafting of words so they render an image or a nuance of emotion just perfectly and delight when the process of careful crafting leads us to discovery. I did this passionately in my recently completed historical novel, The Tremble of Love; I lost myself in getting it just right: true to the character, the scene, the moment...

Here in this blog, as nobody special taking notes on the journey home, I will playfully allow... Words are the containers in which I hold just about everything: my delight, thankfulness, bewilderment, prayer, Love... I first heard the expression: "Don't hide your light under a bushel," from my friend, Annie Bissett (an artist whose light shines through her strikingly original—sometimes whimsical, often profound, always inspirational—Japanese woodblock prints). I have made the decision to let the bushels of words come out from where they might otherwise cower under the dark shrouds of Doubt, Judgement, Not Good Enough, and other shadows cast by fear. I invite you to do the same in your own way: to let your light shine, to bring your full bushels to the festival....