Once
upon a time there was a nice man who started a blog and liked to write posts
that revolved around his family growing up and his own wife and kids. These
posts made him happy because it reminded him of all the wacky, weird, funny and
nice things that happened to him when he was a kid, and they helped him to see
how blessed he was to have such an awesome family now. Although this man didn’t
have much in the way of material possessions growing up, he had something that
many kids didn’t. He knew he was loved by parents who did their best to teach
him what was important in life, and by his brothers and sisters, even if they
occasionally got into arguments or fights.
The
man did his best to put aside some time each week to write his post, to edit
it, and to make it just right in the hope that someone would read it and smile,
maybe even laugh, or say “Hey, I remember that!” Hopefully there would be only good
memories, because in his mind the good had far outweighed the bad. Not that
everything was perfect growing up, far from it, but isn’t it easier to recall
the good and the positive than it is to scrounge around the depths of your
brain and relive the bad and the negative? Posting to his blog pleased the man,
for he loved to write and to share with others the things he had done and been
through as the eighth of nine kids. He wanted others to know that family was
and always would be one of the most important things in his life.
Then
something terrible happened to him. It was a project at work, or more importantly,
a project deadline. His usual writing time was taken over by work related
activities because this project “just had to be out the door” by a certain
date. He was okay with this for a short time, but then the deadline got moved
out by a couple of weeks. Being the hard worker his parents had taught him to
be, he kept up the crazy schedule in order to make the new deadline. Much to
his despair, the deadline was moved out a couple more weeks with the
expectation that it would take the same effort to meet the newest deadline. Weekends
became more time to work instead of spending time with his family.
Not
wanting to leave gaps in his blog, the nice man hastily threw together a few
posts and put them up for everyone to see, knowing in his heart they weren’t his
best. “I guess it’s better to have a mediocre post than no post at all.” he
thought. This comforted him and helped him to make it through the long days
spent at his work laptop, doing what he had to in order to keep a steady
paycheck. Yet, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he could somehow make some
time to work on his blog. There just had to be a way.
However,
when he sat down to write something for his blog, there was nothing but an
empty screen staring back at him. It seemed that his blog posting days were
over, gone like the long summer days that he missed out on because he was
working to meet a project deadline. This made the man sad, for it took away the
pleasure of writing and the happiness of recalling fun times with friends and
family. “It’s over.” he thought. “I’ve lost my creative drive. I’ve got nothing
to write about.”
The
moral of this story: All work and no play makes “8 of Nine” a dull blog.
