Good morning, blogosphere

Good morning, blogosphere. (Crowed in a tone reminiscent of Robin Williams’ “Good Morning, Vietnam“.)

It’s taken me a little time to pull things together – or to get them as pulled together as they are, so far.

All this feels a bit like Penny Sycamore, in the George Kaufman, Moss Hart play, “You Can’t Take it With You.” In the first scene of the play, Penny says to her daughter, Essie, “The only trouble with dancing is, it takes so long. You’ve been studying such a long time.” Essie replies, “Only eight years. After all, Mother, you’ve been writing plays for eight years. We started about the same time, didn’t we?” Then Penny says, “Yes, but you shouldn’t count my first two years, because I was learning to type.”

Well, I learned to type quite some time ago. But blogging, for me, is a more recent development.

I was introduced to the blogosphere when Mike Elgan wrote a guest post on Leo Babauta’s Zen Habits blog. Mike posted his “Learning From Trash” entry in late May of 2007.

Leo’s “Zen Habits | Simple Productivity” blog is in Technorati’s top 100 list. It’s even higher in the “Most Linked To” list than in the “Most Favorited” list.

As far as blogging is concerned, Leo is my model. Zen Habits is a lush oasis of amazing common sense ideas about how to improve your life – with suggestions swirling about five foci: productivity & organization, finance & family, simplicity, happiness, and health.

In a post – or, you might say, in an article – Leo often presents a panoply of points, from which you can pick the ideas that feel best suited to your needs and temperament. If what you try works, then you can go on to try something more – if it doesn’t work, as well as you want, then you can shift over and try something different. The idea is: to try something. To persist. To work toward making your life into what you want it to be – rather than allowing life to trample you into formless misery.

On Zen Habits, recently, I found an article on “15 Can’t-Miss Ways to Declutter Your Mind.” And an article on “25 Killer Actions to Boost Your Self-Confidence.” There’s hyperbole in the titles, which is essential if a writer wants to catch a reader’s eye. And there’s solid help and caring support offered inside.

Over time, I’ve watched Leo’s ideas evolve: as he tries them, as he discovers that some things work better than others, as he shares his new understanding with his readers. And I’ve watched his blog evolve, as he recently redesigned his presentation.

When I say Leo is my model, I’m not saying that I think I can come anywhere close to matching his focus, his quality, or his prolific content. But for an image and a sense of quality, I look immediately and reflexively to his Zen Habits blog.

I have started a blog about dementia (Dementia: The Path Beyond the Tears), because that is a path where I must find my way – and I am only just getting started. I am also starting another blog – about writing (Star Stuff Writer), because writing is what I do, whether I’m writing a blog entry, or a letter, or a project plan, or in a journal, or in any number of other contexts.

Then I asked myself, if I’m going to work on writing for two fairly focused blogs, in two areas that are important to me, then where do I write about Peter Paul and Mary as a holiday tradition, or about the pizza I made that the FDA immediately declared a controlled substance (fortunately, I finished the pizza before the FDA ruling came down – or unfortunately, if I consider how uncomfortably stuffed I was afterward – but it was far and away the most delicious pizza I’ve ever made).

As I considered where to write about PP&M and pizza, the answer formed in my mind, just like Captain Kirk always arrived, glittering and sparkling, beamed up by the starship transporter.

The answer to my question was a third blog – perhaps one less restrictively focused than the other two – called Star Stuff Life.