I'm here!

I've had a few people mention that they've checked my blog and found that there are no new posts. This is true. I haven't even been back to my blog since I wrote the last post.

I recently decided that I DO NOT like social networking on Facebook. In my opinion, Facebooking encourages "I'll spy on you and you spy on me," rather than regular discourse and sharing with friends. At first, I just attempted to put my money where my mouth is and comment on peoples' shares as much as I could. Soon, I realized that with the numbers of friends on my list, I couldn't keep up with it. I narrowed down my friend list, removing people who either never posted, never replied when I tried to talk to them, or never commented on my posts. I did this rather badly without giving people warning. Interestingly, not many people either tried to "re-friend" or emailed to ask why. In this last little while, I've decided that while I like Facebook to get updates on nature centers and museums, photos of Michigan, and updates on other interesting-to-me pages that I have "liked," I really need to pull out of that arena. This time, I sent messages to people as I unfriended them.

In the process of all of this, I realized that my Facebook updates had taken place of journaling for my family on my blog. I thought I might come back here to do some writing. I still think that's a good possibility. One things I really want to do is write a series of letters to my children. This was inspired by another friend who recently used her blog to write a letter to her children for them to read when they are older.

I'll probably also journal some of my thoughts and feelings about leaving the LDS church. A couple people have approached me recently with some discomfort of my different views and the way I was expressing them. I'm glad that they did write to me. It caused me to pause and think a bit. One of the things I would like to explain is that I wasn't posting links on Facebook to attack anyone or their beliefs. I was doing this because I found them interesting, because I agreed with what the link was saying, or because I wanted to reference the article for later use. I can see, though, why people with a certain frame of reference could feel attacked. Future blog posts may also contain information that some people will be sensitive to. I invite you to read if you wish or avoid those posts. I don't mind if you have differing views and want to share those. Just be sure you know that I'm won't be writing these posts AT anyone else, but FOR myself.

What have we been doing in the almost two years since I last wrote?? If I had to sum it up in just a few words: BIRDS, camping, hiking, observing nature, singing, getting good grades, performing, growing up, watching documentaries, shifting paradigms, doing artwork, traveling, attending lectures, going to museums and gardens, participating with Ohio Young Birders and Audubon, playing, discussing politics and religion, loving life.

I hope to find that some of you are still out there, but if not, that's o.k. too because I just need a place to write!