Rose Colored Glasses

I was browsing through my blog entries and noticed a pretty interesting pattern...  I tend to post when I can link to a photo sharing group.  I post  when I am personally in turmoil.  I post when I am celebrating a milestone. 

I truly enjoy documenting the lives of my children and I hope that one day they'll enjoy reading the blog books I'm having printed for them.  But if I focus only on the exciting adventures, the peaks of happiness, and the fabulous times we share, I am cheating them out of their real histories. 

As a journalist, I was taught to seek the story behind the headlines that everyone else went after.  There's a reason why certain dates are important - why certain activities conjure up memories and others are just happenstance (love that word even if I can't spell it).  Some days I grapple with full disclosure wondering if it's safe to share intimate details in such a public forum and I'm always fascinated by the occassional comments I get about what I write (which I don't share with my cherubs regardless of what was said).  If a visitor were to read the latest linked post, they might draw the false conclusion that life is perfect.

Admittedly, I am pretty blessed: a home, a job, two kids, two dogs, close family and friends, hobbies.  But seeing life through that superficial rose colored glasses picture damages the image being presented.  There are real problems, there is heartache, their is real life trial.  I struggle for balance.  I pray for wisdom and strength.  And I make mistakes - lots of them. 

I enjoy reading the blogs of other people - mostly mothers - and I always leave their posts thinking man, my life must seem pretty easy to others.   It's certainly not a priviledged life, but maybe it is easier in some ways.  I wonder if some of the problems I deal with are self created (like debt, being a single parent, feeling discontent with my career).  I wonder if what I chose to share (and what I don't) taints perception.

My daughter's a reader now.  She often stands behind me as I post and she reads each line with slow deliberation.  She sounds out difficult or new vocabulary and waits for a definition.  She smiles at the pictures.  She adds her own opinion on the topic (and when she walks away I try hard to add it in the way she phrased it). She critiques the posts. 

It's then that I remember why I write in the first place.  For M.Y. Chi  and for myself - - so that when memory fails me there is a record of our lives then and now.   I don't want to forget a moment - - even the hard ones.  I write and I post the only story I can honestly tell.  My story exactly as I live it.  And since it is my story, I think I'm going to make an extra effort to blog about more than just the big events that we'll remember anyway... otherwise there isn't much point in keeping a record.