I have been blogging since I returned from Zimbabwe last May, but I have been terribly erratic. This is my first post since early December. As the world slipped quietly into the 21st century’s second decade, I promised myself I would be more consistent.

I first thought of blogging as a way of building my “platform” as a writer, getting my name out there in hopes that more people might buy and read my books. It is now very apparent, and has been for a while, that no one is waiting for my next blog-encased utterance. I am quite sure that some of my posts have been read only by me and by my wonderful proof-reading partner, Paul. Yes, the sad—or could it be happy?—truth is that no one needs this “Entangled Writer” blog.

Nevertheless, something has kept me going, albeit anemically, and as I was posting my last blog I finally understood what it is. I began that post as a rant against sports mania, in particular the Ducks mania that has the entire town of Eugene in a stronghold. I am not a football fan, and I am not a joiner, and I feel entirely outside this ra-ra explosion of team loyalty. But, as I explored this point on paper (yes, I write longhand), I remembered back to a time when I was caught up in sports mania—1986, New York City, the Mets. I loved bonding with so many strangers over stunning plays and repeated victories. I loved the sense of community that existed throughout the city during that period. And as I recalled those days and wrote about that sense of community, my rant began to soften; I lost my sense of indignation and superiority; I changed my opinion, and discovered my more complicated and truer thoughts.

Every day we all have thousands of small perceptions and ruminations that float through our brains. Most of these are fleeting, lost to the myriad distractions of plowing through a day. But when you stick with one of these ideas, when you do not let your mental gaze stray, you begin to see that thing in new ways. Writing is a way of staying focused, of probing an idea (or a story) until you see its concealed underbelly. By blogging I’ve been able to hold on to some of these fleeting thoughts and ask myself: So where does that take me? So what does this mean?

It is a truism in fiction writing circles that writing is a process of discovery, and I have always believed this wholeheartedly. In writing a novel I never know exactly where I’m going at the outset—it often takes getting down a complete draft before I know what the work is about. It is a process that can’t be rushed, has no shortcuts. Gradually the aboutness of the story becomes clear, but not unless you keep your gaze firmly fixed, unless you stay the course.

So that’s why I blog. Staying focused, I learn what I think.