I can do this...

My mom told me never to put anything in writing that I might want to take back. That was back in the day when you put pen to paper and it took at least two days, and a dime, to arrive in the snail mail…particularly agonizing if you had decided that some things would have been better left unsaid. I figured out for myself to leave a heated e-mail sit in the draft folder over night. After sufficient venting and suffering through the prerequisite cooling off period I am generally relieved in the morning that I didn’t hit send.

One time my daughter Sarah, now 27, wrote a note to self on a tiny piece of paper that said “My teacher sucks” and buried it in her desk. A fourth grade classmate tattled. The teacher dug it out of her desk and I found myself explaining to the principal that it should not have been taken literally. Although literal interpretation is a subject worthy of debate, the real lesson here is, don’t put stupid stuff in writing.

“Don’t write it if you can say it, don’t say it if a nod will do” came from my husband. My friend Bob was heard on occasion to tell Charlotte, his wife of many years, “You would have sounded better if you hadn’t said that”. And someone at some point, although I don’t remember who, told me to taste my words before I spit them out.

So having been duly advised, and in full acknowledgment of all the aforementioned life experiences, I am throwing all caution to the wind. The blog intrigues me. It has sucked me in and I am venturing out into the vast unknown. I can do this.

And there is always the delete button, right?