My siter wrote me a letter that said, "...If I ever walked the trail, I
would never climb all the way to the top of Katahdin.  I would sit down
almost to the top and contemplate.  I never want to be able to say I
conquered a mountain, they deserve more respect than humanity gives them."

To which I reply: The only way to respect the valleys is to view then from
the top of the mountain.  To feel just how deep they've run.

[Afternoon freewrite]
I sit here and want to think of something to  write that will be
earthshattering.  This is a common occurrence, I think.  But I don't know
that it's all that common for writers to escape it.  Because we're all
writers, aren't we?  It's just that some of us have ahd writer's block since
we were twelve....  I know that I've had writers block for quite some time.
I want to say something important.  NAd it's the lack of getting my writeing
"right" that keeps me from finishing things.  Or even beginning them.  If I
want to write about something that happened in the store, fo instance, and
why it is that the incident has so much meaning, I cannot express the
vastness of thouhghts and ideas and nuances that interact with that
incident.  Not in one sitting.  So I cannot begin and thus I lose it.

One must learn that a piece of writing is never truly finished.  You can
craft and craft, refine and redefine.  The work that you work on will evolve
and evolve and evolve.  Every time you write something it will get better.

My father has it in for the word evolve and evolution.  I think it's because
he's getting too old and taking up a cause that's meaningless.  I wonder if
that's just the idiot younger generation in me or if it's a true
observation?  I have doubts.  Doubts doubts doubts.  I value language.  It's
my friend (even if or perhaps because I can't control it to my satisfaction.
As once people credited the muse to inspire and guide their hand, so I ask
words to be my friends and together we may form a thing of beauty rahter
than by my hand alone.[inadequate hand])  And whenever he says "Why did they
have to use that word?  It's just... blah blah blah"  I feel that .... It's
not right.  The word means what it means despite it's other connotations,
nuances.  It means to change.  With the hint that it's a change for the
better.

Many in our fmaily are unable to find confrontation valuable.  We avoid it
like the plague.  Then there are others that bring it like a stormcloud
around them.  I wish to be neither.  But can I succeed?  I don't think I
shall ever find peace.  And perhaps I do not wish to.
[End afternoon freewrite]