on rambling

There are times in life when everything seems to line up just right. I think that’s kind of how this blog has come about. A friend here (shout out to Phil and Philip) and a friend there (props to Tom) brought it up in a simple and serious way and the idea just didn’t leave me. That’s probably only part of it though; I can’t help but think there’s more to it. After all, life sometimes plops me down in funny places that put me in funny moods. I try to remember that it’s best to keep a sense of humour, though. Laughing has a way of taking the sting out of the cuts and scrapes of living. Even at the best of times, moments when my soul is singing along, sometimes I feel an emptiness, a hollow kind of loneliness that creeps in and puts me under its great shadow. Maybe that doesn’t make much sense, but I’m seeing more and more that living is a paradox: I feel that hollow feeling, where everything seems to be crumbling away, but at the same time, I feel so loved and so grateful for my brilliant friends and family. It comes down to something like you can’t conceive of loneliness unless you can conceive of love.

And so, I ramble on thru life. It’s a good name for the blog, I think. I looked “ramble” up in the dictionary—to ramble: wander around in a leisurely, aimless manner; talk or write in a discursive, random way; walk without a definite route, taken merely for pleasure; or (my favourite) grow in a random, unsystematic fashion. I think that last one refers to plants or vines, but it’s probably closest to what I’ll be rambling on about. Straying from one bit to another, just writing about whatever comes. But I should mention that I also have a tendency to ramble about (as in wander off). For instance, I just got back from Phoenix three days ago. Every once in awhile, I just seem to get that itch, and I go wandering off. Or rambling on...