Writing 4 Ur Life

Blogging from a writers' conference in Holland, Michigan. Processing? Preserving something? Maybe a little bit of preening, surrounded by all these people who I'm sure have written and published reams of whatever?

The idea was to go do something different, take some time away from work, feed the writer in me. The conference is called--well, I'm not totally sure what it's formally called but it's put on by Writing for Your Life, or, on Twitter, writing4urlife.

There's a lot in that "for"? Or, on Twitter, "4"?

Writing your life--well, I've done plenty of that here on The Perverse Lutheran. If not moment by moment, blow by blow, then mood by mood, or at least epoch by epoch. But "for your life"?

Prepositions are about relationships between words, and relationships are tricky to explain. We feel our way into them, can't always describe them. In language, when it comes to prepositions we often rely on "sprachgefühl," the feeling of the language, what we know intuitively. In human relationships there's intuition, too. Though that can lead you astray.

So writing for your life--what would that be?

Often for me a Perverse Lutheran post is the answer to, well, feeling pissy--unmoored, unnoticed, tangled, frustrated, bogged down in stupid stuff, un-brilliant, uncreative. I put a sentence or two up on the screen and then wander through to where it takes me. It's like traveling, or exercise. It's speaking a truth--tentatively (because blogs--they're over quickly) and wondering if I can get others to see it too.

It's making sense of my life, for the sake of going on with it--whatever it is, real or written.