New Days
I think you’re supposed to write like no one is looking. And that worked for a long while, until I realized people were looking. And that was okay, until I started to meet the people who were looking. Then I came to understand that while they were my audience, I knew they had opinions about other things, and I began to worry I might say something to offend them, because every once in a while, I wanted to write about something other than my yard.
Finally, I decided to jump up and say what I wanted to say before this last election, and as I suspected, it upset a fair number of people. Then things didn’t go the way I hoped. So, I decided I’d go back to writing about my yard, because I didn’t really want to be a political commentator anyway. I’m not well enough educated, and I felt it was ground I could leave to influencers, academics, and real journalists. Although I’m pretty sure the internet has made real journalism difficult, if not impossible.
For instance, I have no idea why two television networks settled lawsuits about news stories, given that we have freedom of the press. All it says to me is that the person filing the suit might have had a point. So, it seems all that’s left is a babble of voices selling things, and that doesn’t feel like a great way to run a country. But maybe this is simply a chaotic, interim period where we sort things out and figure out which way we want to go in this new digital world, and come up with something new and exciting. I can only hope we end up deciding that the truth is important, regardless of how uncomfortable it makes us.