Blogiversary: filters, formulas, modesty and wisdom

Transfiguration Sunday tomorrow. Means it's time to write a Blogiversary post, marking 13 years of The Perverse Lutheran. So I'm huddled at Starbucks while my daughter is at Saturday afternoon bowling. I'm sitting at a high counter under a speaker that's pouring out beats and female vocals that I'm sure are fairly bland, pop-culture-wise, but that I find irritating.  So I've layered Debussy piano music through my headphones onto the general aural ambience at Starbucks. The volume on my computer is turned as high as it goes and it's still not much of a solution to the problem. Unless the pianist is digging into the keys, banging out a big and percussive sound, the pop music leaks through.

My own thoughts? Can't seem to hear them.

One reasons is that there are so many more voices that I follow in the public media these days. So many pundits, so many echoing and self-referential Twitter accounts, so many ads and silly videos on Facebook. So many books on library shelves, so many next to my chair in the living room. So many books piled up in my Audible account, waiting for me to string together bits and pieces of listening time until I've heard the whole 8-hour, or 18-hour, story.

Why keep keep adding to the cosmic word count?

In the past 13 years I've immortalized (well, written about) fledgling cardinals in my back yard, conversations in Bible study groups, various communities of which I'm a part, my sons, my daughter,  ALS, Alzheimer's, funerals, knitting, grey days in February and beautiful days in May and June. (Perhaps I'll go back and add links for all those examples. Perhaps not.)

I do, I confess, go back and read old blog posts from time to time, in hopes of finding something that  I'm not embarrassed to read later. Sometimes the writing works, if I have looked and listened with openness and humility and haven't given up too soon.

Are these things helpful or interesting to others? Edifying? (I use that word without irony. I like that word.) I do apply that filter before I'm too many paragraphs into a post. That's one reason why the back side of this blog has so many abandoned drafts, especially in the last year or two. I think again before I hit the Publish button. I am not only a Perverse Lutheran but also what some call a Modest Lutheran. Despite all my inner and outer arrogance, a voice from childhood -- the same tone used to recite questions and answers from the catechism -- reminds me of how little my inner life matters to the rest of the world.

My best blog post formula starts with an image, seen, heard, or even imagined. There's a description, some sense of movement or change, questions and wondering, and perhaps a glance toward wisdom or a surprise.

Wisdom gives me an image for the end of this post: the wisdom tooth that I had pulled yesterday. It was ugly to look at, rocked out of my jaw and then held up before my eyes by the oral surgeon.

And yet.

I've had it a long time. It's decayed, no longer used for chewing and not worth the cost of a crown. So, it's gone. All the wisdom left in me must be in my head or my heart, perhaps in my breath and body (because I'm back at yoga). Does any of it date from the years when those wisdom teeth first came in? Is any of it worth sharing (though surely much of it is shared already)?

Thank you, dear readers, for reading. Time to hit the road and leave that Starbucks speaker behind!