jury dismissed

I've taken pen to paper lately.

I used to live for ink. To have time for my 'guilty pleasure' of journaling.  To dive into the pages, between the covers.

In the past few years, I do more composing at the computer. And since I've had my laptop, a bit over a year now, I type from it a lot. It's like it has become another appendage. Funny that, because just five years ago I didn't really like computers.

As I sat in the Jury Pool Room at the courthouse last week awaiting to be called into the courtroom and questioned as potential jurors are, I wrote with ink in one of my journals, a Moleskine.

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[journal entry]

Thursday, 8/26/10

I currently find myself not feeling as free to write publicly. Sit with that Carol. Just sit with it in your heart.

Get back to writing Carol. Write for no one else.

But is that possible?

Once, or rather since, I blog and am public with my words, I find it difficult to write for me. Yet that is how I started. Some of my first public things I put on display were writings that were hidden in my journals. Recall how nervous I was? How I trembled at my keyboard?

Once a person opens their life for the public to view, once a writer exposes their soul, those inner works are committed to the public eye.  Once that happens, the writer is open to criticism and their words become open game. Open game on a few levels.

• The "quality" of the writing in content, grammar, structure, punctuation, etc.
• Is what is written accurate? Facts, places, peoples, times.
• The author's motive gets attacked. Questions as to why is the author making their life public - it must be pride of wanting attention or narcissistic or something along those lines.
• Whatever is written and read, the reader interprets as the reader will. The reader brings their life experiences with them to the page.

So especially in light of the fourth thing above, why do I, Carol, write publicly? Hmm. Perhaps the fourth thing doesn't prompt the question, but rather the answer. My answer, at least part of the answer, as to why I blog.

This is something I come back to again and again.

If I were to create, design, display a poem or a piece of music or work of art - why do I put in on display?  That would be a good question for any artist, would it not?

[end of journal entry]

****

I then pulled out Sudoku while I continued waiting in the Jury Pool Room.

The trial was a criminal trial involving a drug dealer. The accused plead guilty that morning. There was no need at that point for a jury. We were all dismissed.