I noticed when I was writing my last post, which was pretty much a middle school essay on a movie I like, that I got tired of writing it pretty quickly. I had points I wanted to make, but I was getting bored while trying to make them.
That’s not a good sign.
For most of my life, I’ve been a writer. I started keeping diaries and writing stories in elementary school, and even though I didn’t write daily, I wrote enough that it was obvious I loved writing.
Somewhere along the way, I stopped writing regularly. I’m pretty sure “somewhere” coincides closely with my joining Twitter in February of 2007. I have spent a lot of time pouring my thoughts out there…but what I do on Twitter isn’t writing. It’s stream of consciousness, and often it isn’t worth reading at all. I even avoid using @ mentions sometimes so I don’t have to worry about someone important or smart seeing what I’ve said about a subject that concerns them.
I don’t try to write on Twitter. If anything, Twitter gives me an excuse not to try. And as I’ve continued not writing, my writing skills and endurance have atrophied almost to the point of nothing.
This isn’t what I want for myself. It’s not how I’ve spent most of my life.
So I’ve decided to start writing regularly. If not every day, every other day. I won’t worry about length, but I will worry about quality. If what I write is something I could have dashed off in 30 seconds on Twitter, it won’t count.
I want my writing to have meaning again. So here goes.