Sometimes I don't know exactly what I'm doing until somebody points it out to me.

My sister used to refer to me as a Blivit--as in oblivious to everything around me. On occasion, I'm oblivious to when something's going on inside of me, too.

So, when my blog-friend Terry posted something about my Why We Read Blogs essay, I sat back and had to think about it (check the post out here and the rest of Terry's blog I See Invisible People).

Terry says that reading my blog is "like excavating a novel..."

I knew what I was doing with this blog wasn't the form of journalism that people like Dave Winer of BloggerCon believe blogs to be (wish I could find the link to that comment.) I always thought that journalism was something you had to go to school to learn something about, and to be a journalist required learning the craft.

Even if an artist works mostly in abstracts, she usually knows how to craft a skillful drawing too.

Like art, journalism doesn't just happen. Blogs happen. And for lots of reasons.

When I read Terry's comment, I sat back and thought more about what I wanted for this little blog. I wasn't necessarily looking to make myself a political pundit, although, on occasion, I have political opinions. I was, though, looking to make this blog a bridge between my fiction writing and my journaling. My journaling was extemporaneous and unstructured. My fiction was crafted and structured but going nowhere.

I wanted to paint in words the pictures of events in my life; to create word snapshots of moments that are unphotographable. There were many incidents I wanted to remember forever that were not properly put down in my journals and that fictionalizing would not do justice. These were the things I would blog about.

Life has a visual texture, but there are times when showing that texture in pictoral form is inappropriate or awkward. So, I tell the tale of a colorful event and of the impression it leaves on my soul..like the beauty of Lucky Bastard stepping out of the shower, or the strength of Steady Eddie's arms; my mother in her hospital room, or the fume in my sister's eyes. Words discretely capture a type of internal depth and external image..while a photograph would intrude and show only the superficial.

Maybe that's the hallmark of a good journalist though--the ability to use words to convey the color, texture, and depth of field of the world around her.

Life events, though, seem to be joined or bound up with other events, not existing as separate stand-alone articles. Life events aren't quite like issues of a newspaper but more like chapters of a novel.

So, I'm a novelist, I guess.

Thanks, Terry.