Blogging Brain Gone Bad

"Blogging is easy. Writing is hard."

~Jennifer Shreve

I came across this little quote in a book called Not Quite What I Was Planning. Its pages are filled with six-word quips about life and death and everything in between. Six words were all any of the writers were allowed.

I've blogged about my fascination with this book in the past, so I don't intend to sing its praises for too long here. Instead, I've decided to write about this particular quote, this "blogging is easy, writing is hard" idea. It is an idea I used to believe, but now I'm not so sure.

It used to be that blogging was so much easier than writing. Blogging was off the top of my head, as compared to "writing," which took forethought and persistence.

Blogging was also a chance to exercise my "visual" tendencies. I've always considered myself a visual learner and I like to play around with photography and layout design, a thrill that is rarely afforded to me as a freelance writer. I just turn in the words; someone else gets to illustrate my article. Not so with blogging. It's my blog and therefore my "vision."

But lately, I'm having trouble doing much writing or blogging. Frankly, I'm having trouble doing anything that feels ultra productive or professional. I've passed my days putting pictures in photo albums, walking my dogs, reading books, drinking beer on the porch, lazing around.

It's been a beautiful July in Minnesota. The sky is the most perfect shade of blue. The trees are the most perfect shade of green. The sun is the most perfect warming light. It is exactly the July I always remember July being when I was a little girl and it is because of this, perhaps, that I have reverted to girlhood ways. School is out and my brain is on vacation.