Seven years of blogging

On this date seven years ago I made my way on to the Internet of public consumption. It was a timid beginning full of vague aphorisms and run-on sentences. In a time before Facebook, I was writing status updates calling out to the world with digital smoke signals. As time went on, I've come to require more from my writing, not a whole lot more, but a bit more. I've chronicled ups and downs, runs, dives, sweet catches, whimsical tales, vanity, tales from the city, tales from vacation and a other things that cross my path. Until this month, my posts had grown more sporadic, but more complete, or at the very least longer. The range of topics has become more narrowly focused and my delight in turning a phrase harder to come by. I've been ready to call it quits many times, but so far something always brings me back. It's nice to be heard and since my memory seems to be failing, it's nice to have a record of some of the major achievements and goings on of the last seven years. There are milestones missing that were too private or too complicated, but much of my life appears in this very space.

I never thought this would be a project that lasted seven years when I started, nor that this would be my seventh year with my employer or my seventh year with the Ultimate team. If I were a slot machine, this would be a winner. There is the sound of change that slowly clinks out in triumph. It's not the rush of a jackpot, but it is change and triumph nonetheless.

In seven years, I've gone from jobless to temp to employed to snug as a bug in an office (sometimes maybe a little too snug). I've run a marathon, written 50,000 words in a month, traveled to Paris, Iceland, Norway, Idaho, read a bunch of books, watched even more movies, run 5k after 5k after 5k with a few miles and lots of Ultimate mixed in. I've become a coach, an uncle, a brother-in-law, a boyfriend. I've been tested and challenged. I've given up my car. I've turned to the darkness and purchased a cell phone and then lost the darkness and am trying to find my way back to a landline. I've struggled with my place in the world and the rules I should follow. I've moved. I've biked. I've changed. I don't know what it will be like to read this in seven more years or if it will even be here, but I know that at this moment I'm pleased to take a moment to celebrate life, the Internet, and a pursuit I'm not sure I even understand.

Maybe I'll figure it out tomorrow.