Would ya look at that. Who knew?

In February of 2008, I thought it’d be a good idea for me to flex my creaky writing muscles and get some regular practice at what was, at that time, the hottest form of quick publishing: the web log, or “blog.”

I started over at wordpress.com when it looked like this (this is today — pretty snazzy). After about two posts in, I decided I wanted more control and flexibility, and a day later, finkweb.org was hatched.

What’s the coolest part about all this? It’s an answer my vast readership of 100 souls worldwide probably already know. It’s them. You. Writers write for various reasons: pay, enjoyment, therapy, self-realization, vanity, communication, survival…pick one. I write for the two-way street element blogging generates. It’s a drug to me, which might lead some to look at my posts over the last year or so and surmise that I am now addiction-free.

Not quite.

Rather, I seem to have fallen victim to the Lennon-ism of life happening while I was making other plans. (NB: While Lennon did include that lyric in his song “Beautiful Boy,” he apparently didn’t coin it. Who says you can’t learn anything from Reader’s Digest?) Life has happened and happened and happened while I was making plans to write every morning. My family dynamic alone has brought me much change and joy. When I started this little adventure, I had a four-month-old grandson named Jake. He’s since been joined by brother Justin and cousins Anderson and Arthur. The Thriller’s daughter married and inherited two wonderful stepchildren named Bri and Jay Jay. With a grandparent card this full, what’s not to love about that kind of “busy?” They are the joy of our lives.

I always thought that as I chased the bright, elusive butterfly of retirement from public school teaching, I would somehow become less overwhelmed with the machinations of life; I’d slow down and smell flowers and porch-sit and such. Hasn’t happened. On the contrary, the ramp-up in bizzy is alarming. Why is that? Am I trying to smush everything in during the remaining six or seven years until my retirement, even though retirement from one job will simply mean the undertaking of another? (I’ll never not work, so long as I’m physically and mentally able.) Where’s the sense in that?

Matters not, I think. What’s important is the “now,” and this day, I have you. You read my nonsense and respond in friendship and with great insight. I love that about you.

So what’s the future of RtB? My most hopeful answer is “smooth sailing.” Or at least a navigable course in life’s choppier moments. Thank you — and you know who you are — for sticking around with me.

Hey, wanna see the new Finkmobile? OK.  Mama’s new go-kart goes.

HB to RtB — vroom