Before. Before the whole damned roof fell on both of us, before we lost money, business, and health, before we both got horribly sick, before my guy Nearly Fucking Died, before All That, I had a blog called Write and Wrong. Hacking at the tough soil of Blogger, I eventually acquired seven able-bodied readers whom I treasured. They made me feel like Alexander Pope, of whom it's said, knew all his readers too, what with the wretched 18th C. literacy rates.

I started this blog for several reasons. The first and most pressing was that I noticed I was wandering around in a state of outrage and pissed-offedness unsuitable for a 5'3" late middle-aged woman, one with incipient osteoporosis to boot and one who could not afford a good ass-kicking. Second, I thought that writing for the Web was different from writing for print but I didn't know why I thought that, and the only way to find out was to write for the gangly beast. Third, I'd always felt there was a tight ungoofy relationship between art and morality, and when I taught art I always mentioned it. I'm far from the first person to recognize this kinship, but didn't know why I felt that way and it was time to do some digging. And so I went adventuring.

Since that balmy time, there have been shifts and changes in our lives, my hub's and mine, many for the good, but all dearly bought and dearly paid. It's taking me some time to see the next bend in the river. My guy is far better, much healthier, and wiser than I'd be in his same shoes. I am much braver and less of a twit.There are many stories leading us to this point, and all those have to be told, but not quite yet.

As it says in the side-bar, I'm a freelance writer. And before that I went to art school and was a professional painter. It was a wonderful education and profession, one that hasn't changed much in 500 years or so, and it was good for writing.

My education taught me a lot of specifics about viewers and readers. One specific was that writing is ultimately for readers, and painting is ultimately for viewers. This isn't quite the duh conclusion it seems. I write about stuff that rubs me raw, true, but I mostly write for my readers: to entertain, to lighten the load, to joke, to make people laugh, maybe to infect someone with a new idea, maybe to take something frightening and show that the truth of it isn't that bad.

Now I'm involved in some pretty breath-taking dental work, although not of the $40K variety I described, but it's massive and I'm operating at a low wattage. Still, my urge to tap dance a dance or two, to whistle you a tune is as strong as ever. So I'm going to be reposting some of my Write and Wrong pieces here, hoping you'll laugh or mutter to yourself, or feel either delighted or justified in your annoyances however it happens. I may even break in from time to time as I can, with reports of my guy, my neighborhood, and our raw tangy Texas paradise.

So keep watching this space.