The Blog is a Year Old

I wrote my first blog post just over a year ago, on March 3, 2010. This is my 67^th post, so I've been cranking them out at the rate of one every six days since then.

Some have been slightly shorter, some longer than 500 hundred words, but I try to stay close. This one is exactly 500 words.

I've written about politics, economics, travel, cocktails, daily life, Kurt Browning – anything that interested me and that I was just bursting to tell someone about. I've tried to inform, explain, persuade, praise, question, criticize, and ridicule. Sometimes I just needed to vent. Sometimes I tried to be funny.

Some posts have been easy to write, the work of half an hour. Others have taken days and many rewrites. Some I never published. One or two, I took down after posting them briefly. If you're thinking about writing your own blog, here's a tip: don't drink and blog.

I've know I've made some mistakes and I not every post was a winner, but there are a few that I particularly enjoyed writing and am proud of. I think I've improved as a writer, but you're a better judge of that than I am.

There have been nearly 3,000 visits to the blog, about 60 a week, and I know many of you are family and friends who return regularly. Thank you for your support and encouragement.

As you might expect, the majority (about 70%) of my readers are from Canada, with the U.S. taking the number 2 spot. After that, there are a few surprises: Germany, Russia, and the Netherlands round out the top 5, followed by the U.K., South Africa, Kuwait, China, and Taiwan. There have been visitors from Malaysia, India, Philippines, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Ghana, Slovenia, Venezuela, Brazil, and the United Arab Emirates. I don't know who you are, or how you found me, but thank you for dropping in. You're always welcome. And feel free to bring your friends; there's lots of room.

At the bottom of the post, you'll find an icon of an envelope with a right-pointing arrow. Click on that to forward to a friend (or enemy). There are other icons there, too, for doing social media-type things that I don't really understand, but if you do, go ahead.

I'd love it if you'd leave a comment. People seem to have no trouble doing so if they're a follower, but other comments don't seem to make it through unless posted anonymously. Keep trying.

A year ago, I invited you to be my audience, to give me 500 words to say what I had to say in the hope that you'd find it interesting. When I started, I had no idea how long I could keep it up, but it seems I haven't run out of things to say yet. I hope you'll stick around.

Yours sincerely,

Aeneas

Just Give Me 500 Words

For twenty-seven years I was a high-school English teacher. In that time I asked thousands of students to give me this- or that-many words on a host of topics.

And then I retired.

I don't miss the bus or hall or cafeteria duty. I don't miss the marking. I sure don't miss the dictates of ministry, board, or office.

What I do miss -- apart from the camaraderie of my colleagues -- is an audience. Whatever else my students were -- a challenge, a frustration, an inspiration -- they were also my audience for twenty-seven years. And they were almost always a tough audience. Sure there were the classes who regarded me with god-like awe (yeah, right), but most of the time I had to work hard to motivate, explain, and entertain.

Now, as my friends (God bless 'em) will tell you, I need an audience. Not only do I delight in the sound of my own voice, I'm one of those people who tends to do his thinking out loud. I try out ideas; I work out plans and schedules; I test opinions. Put uncharitably: I talk not just to myself, but to anyone who can't get out of range quickly enough. You see, I have to hear myself to know if my ideas sound any good, or if they need fine-tuning.

So I've suffered these last few years. Sure, not as much as my friends, my dear wife, or even my cat, but I've missed my audience and I figure the cure is to start blogging.

Don't expect "fair and balanced". Not that I believe every question has a black and white answer; they don't. Most issues worth considering are complex and deserve a nuanced response.

But the truth isn't found in objectivity. And it's the truth, or as near as I can get to it, that I'm after. There is no excusing greed, willful ignorance, or bigotry. I will not patiently endure injustice, falsehood, or stupidity. There was no "other side" to the Nazis. Stalin did not have his "good points".

I hope to do what I tried to do in the classroom all those years: inform, inspire, provoke. I want to question received wisdom, the status quo, and common sense. Maybe I'll annoy. I'm sure someone will catch me in a grammatical or punctuation error. I'll have to apologize.

It's going to take some work. If people are going to read what I have to say, I'd better know what I'm talking about. So I'm prepared to do my homework and I expect I'm going to learn a lot.

I think the hardest part will be putting myself out there on controversial issues where I risk offending those who know me. I hope I can do that. We'll see.

So here I am -- embarking on my second career. For twenty-seven years I was a high school English teacher. Now I'm asking you to be my audience. I hope you're willing to indulge me. Just give me 500 words.