Nothing or Not(One)Thing

I’m not sure how I stumbled upon the A-to-Z Challenge. I don’t typically do blog challenges or memes or group themes. Yet, it struck me as a good framework for blogging, a way to force myself to figure out something to write about, something when it often seemed that there was nothing to write about. For about eight months, I’ve been attempting — mostly succeeding in recent months although that wasn’t the case when I started — to blog everyday.

I like the rhythm of seven posts a week, one a day Monday through Saturday, and one for Sunday written in advance and scheduled. (I try to stay away from the blog on Sundays, although that isn’t always the case.) Since I tend to be an all-or-nothing sort of person, once I commit to something — like daily blogging — I don’t like to slip up and miss a day. Sometimes it becomes a bit obsessive. I worry that if I miss a day I will ruin some sort of personal record and never return to the blog at all. At those times, I need to remind myself that I control my schedule and not the other way around and one miss won’t wreak havoc in the universe, not even in a tiny corner of it.

Although it wasn’t my original intent, posting photographs has become a way to generate content when composing and editing a written post seemed too daunting. The fact that I have recently discovered a passion for photography aided in this, and — I’m glad to admit — has made those don’t want to write posts less lame. Otherwise, blog content around here might subsist on a steady diet of too many links and empty calorie YouTube videos.

The A-to-Z Challenge has been a way for me to write most days. It isn’t impossible, but, I’ve discovered, it is far more difficult than I once imagined to match photographs to a letter of the alphabet, especially if your subjects are shot almost entirely within a radius of about 2 miles during your daily walk. I have recognized over the last few weeks that while I have no shortage of things to write about, I often have difficulties finding a focus. It isn’t that there is nothing to write about, but there are too many things to write about. What is this blog about? It isn’t about nothing; it is not about just one thing. It is about everything.

Some may think that not having a focus, that not being about one particular thing, is a problem. I don’t see it that way. I write about what I know, what I ponder, what I observe, what I read. I take photos of things that occur in the world but that tend to go unnoticed, things that deserve a closer look, things that I have looked upon anew, from a different perspective. I hope that you, dear reader, continue to find something of interest in these posts, these observations of words and images, these bits and pieces from my little space on the planet. At least through the letter Z — and that, in the end, it doesn’t leave you thinking that this is about zilch!

Now, because I like posting photos, here is one that I shot today.  It has nothing to do with the rest of this post.   I was working on manually cleaning the sensor on my camera (yes, it worked!  happy dance!) when I shot a picture of the sky.   A few tree branches and clouds crowded into the frame uninvited.   Naomi, at Poetic Aperture, wrote recently about using textures.  When I commented that I knew little about post-processing — so many choices make it a bit overwhelming to know which apps to use and applications like Gimp and Photoshop with their abundant features present an intimidating barrier to beginning — Naomi suggested that I play with PicMonkey.    With a few more options than iPhoto and an easy interface, this was fun to work with.  Here is one of the results that I came up with.

Artsy? Or overdone?

I also created another version using a  manuscript and paper texture.  I think it will make a nice notecard, maybe to send to one of my oft-forgotten pen pals, like Emily.  (Psst:  you should check out their blogs!)  

Letter writing should come back into style

This post is part of the Blogging A to Z Challenge. Today’s letter is N. Thanks for stopping by. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think. You can find other A to Z participants by clicking on the A-Z graphic above. You’ll find an index of all of my A to Z blog posts here.