I miss having my own newspaper column.
Back when I was writing for the Halifax Community Herald in Nova Scotia, I benefited from having a weekly forum in which I could vent/rant/whinge to my heart's content on myriad issues...a place where I could allow my broken and unchained brain - with all of its rather disorganized and tangential thinking tendencies - free rein. I wasn't restricted to writing about one topic in particular, but instead was given the freedom to weigh in on whatever issue most inspired, upset, enlightened or just straight up pissed me off in any given week.
I miss that freedom, that choice. And I'm feeling a little claustrophobic with just two defined categories on my web page...those being lifestyle and dogs.
And so, I'm giving myself a new outlet; one where I can discuss all of those things that don't currently fit into any one category - like religion, parenting, politics, money - and all those other things we're always told to never talk about at polite dinner parties.
I'm going to list it on my website, under blogs, as Uncommon Sense (as opposed to common sense, which is becoming too rare, it seems, to even be a thing these days).
In my years as a columnist, I was told often, and by many people, that much of what I had to say just simply made sense.
Maybe they were just humouring the weird-brain lady, I don't know...and I'm certainly not claiming to have a handle on everything in this mad world. I do know, however, that living with an ever-present death threat in my head has given me great insight into what is right, and important, and just.
I have also reached a point in my healing/life that I feel (finally feel) confident enough to lay claim to - and to embrace - a few personal traits and beliefs that I have come to be proud of. I am incredibly pragmatic, a notorious outside-of-the-box thinker, couldn't care less about ever becoming wealthy (in a world where money rules lives), and, despite living in a world where a small yet powerful minority controls the vast majority, truly believe that things must change so that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few...or the one.
Yes, I'm with Spock and Vulcan logic on that one.
In short, I believe the world has become - or is fast becoming - a rather ridiculous planet...and I desperately need a place to write - vent/rant/whinge - about just why I feel this way.
If for no other reason than to save my poor Mom from having to listen to me rant and go on about the weird things that are being reported on when we watch the news together, I need a place to put it all.
And so, this is where I'm going to put it....