A few weeks ago I went to Blissdom and complained to my roomate that I am never brave enough to tell the stories I want to tell on my blog. I never have the guts to share the real stuff, the good stuff, the stuff that might make your jaw drop. I keep most people in my life at least an arms lengths away because that is where I feel comfortable but this blog is a whole mile away.

It is my life minus all of the real stuff.

The moment you talk to me in real life you can probably feel the lack of real this blog brings, or maybe you can’t and I am being neurotic.

Writing here is hard. Because I don’t know who is reading this. Because I can’t control who is reading this and that lack of control scares me.

I went to a session at Blissdom and the writer told us we should call ourselves writers. So, I started doing that. And he handed out a worksheet and told us to make a list of the things we would write about if we could write about anything. I didn’t write a single thing on that list because I had been making that list in my mind for the past three years and still standing there with a pen and a private piece of paper I couldn’t write the words.

I came home from Blissdom and Aiden turned six. I tried to write a blog post about it a million times but each time the blog post mostly just said “WHERE DID MY BABY GO” and that isn’t interesting so I didn’t publish them.

You’re welcome.

I still remember being six years old. My mom took me to my neighbors house for a sleepover and she told me that her and my dad were getting divorced. I was relieved but pretended to cry because that is what six year olds are supposed to do when their parents tell them they are getting a divorce. I buried my head into the pillow and squeezed my eyes until it looked like I had been crying.

My parents fought a lot, I think I knew the divorce was coming before they did.

That year my dad drove his Harley more and moved into the garage of a woman he met somewhere. I missed most of the details. But he would take me to drive go-carts and my mom would take me to Chuckee Cheeses every. single. weekend.

They would offer me happy meals at McDonalds if I told them I was happy which of course I was happy because I was six and go-carts and Chuckee Cheeses are the keys to happiness when  you are six.

But now I have a six-year-old and I can’t wrap my head around the idea that I have a child that is the age I still feel inside.

He brought home a harmonica he got for his birthday and told me that he would play it if I promised not to clap at the end because clapping made him embarrassed. I promised not to clap and then realized how much me and this little boy have in common.

This past month has been really hard for me which sucks because so many good things have been happening. I am going to see Oprah, I  got a new car, I have a house and a healthy child and a job I love and have become a person I never imagined becoming (in a good way).

So the fact that things have been hard is really dumb.

I kept trying to write about my feelings in elegant blog posts with vague references to things in metaphorical ways but each time they were diluted and then deleted, because I have an image and a brand and a life where people judge you based on how you think and dress and write and talk.

So, when the going gets tough I hide out.

That is where I have been for the past month. Crossing off my to-do list, wading through car pool, playing more connect four than one should play and distracting myself from writing, from thinking, from dealing with all of this STUFF.

Alas, I am back and trying to figure out what to do with this here blog.