Where to begin....again.

I'll admit it.  Facebook has made me lazy.  So has Instagram.  And texting.  Facetime.  Skype.  

Somewhere along the line, the written word and I parted ways.  Even at work, the need for writing more than 2-3 full sentences with a clearly defined subject and verb has become somewhat obsolete, if not frowned upon.  

Agree with above.  

Patient stable.  

D/C home.  

There aren't even enough syllables to qualify as a haiku.  

Don't get me wrong.  I'm not shopping for quill pens and inkwells.  This isn't some rant against modern technology.  I have enough first-world problems on my mind to try and attempt getting my handwritten memoirs published.  And quite frankly, I do find utility in the quick and (somewhat) mindless act of mass communication.  In a time of ever-increasing distance between family and decreasing time for leisure, I like to think I'm able to put a smile on my mom's face by showing her a snapshot of her newest grandchild.  

No, I think abandoned my ability to chronicle my life consistently way back around 1990 when I thought I could mimic Doogie Howser and keep a journal on my Commodore 128.   Much like the 5.25" floppy disks that stored all of about 4-5 entries, that fell by the wayside.  My next endeavor came in the form of poems and lyrics for the now defunct (but locally legendary) Twinkie's Revenge.  I figured my hopes, dreams and (lack of) conquests would live on forever in the liner notes of our (never released) self-titled album.  And while I've held on to those lyrics and notes, as well as those from my subsequent bands, they still only shed light on a sliver of life from very distinct moments in time.  

Fast-forward 10 years, it's 2006, and I'm heading to Kenya for 6 weeks medical school elective.  During my four years in college, two years of grad school, and four years of medical school, there still wasn't a term called "social media".  I had a Sprint flip-phone that took grainy pictures, a Zen Jukebox mp3 player (because the first generation iPod was way out of my price range), and a brand-spanking-new email account from a company called Google. 

Here is my first blog post (worth reading because I actually reference MySpace...seriously!): http://jerryballas.blogspot.com/2006/03/where-to-begin.html

I wanted to chronicle my trip for friends and family in real time, but also knew that my access to the internet would be spotty, at best.  Uploading a ton of pictures or sitting at an internet cafe and writing a mini-novel would be nearly impossible.   So I would draft my posts on my friend's laptop at night back in our quarters, cut and paste them whenever we'd get internet access, and upload a picture or two.  Ultimately, these posts ended up having enough content, both written and visual, to qualify as my "thesis" for the elective and get me credit to graduate.  

It felt good to write.  I've always enjoyed it.  I figured residency would give me all the material in the world to keep on writing deeper, more thoughtful stories.  And it did.  Without a doubt.  

Except I didn't do the writing part.  

Somewhere in the middle of residency, Facebook appears.  And honestly, as a resident, it became the perfect way to a) communicate with the outside world b) communicate amongst the folks you work with and c) curate your life in such a way that smoothed out the manic-depressive extremes.  I felt like no one needed to see (or read about) the banality of my 24 (or more) hour call, but rather it was the delirious mimosa-fueled brunch we dragged ourselves to afterwards that would ultimately make the editorial cut.  Pretty soon, life in general started getting a similar treatment.  

When I moved to San Diego for fellowship, I decided to take a little different approach.  Since it was such an alien landscape to me, and I found myself taking pictures of such exotic things as palm trees, birds of paradise, and my apartment, I figured I would simply do a photo blog.  It was genius!  I would simply post a picture per day, with or without caption or context.  Profound!  

Mind you, this was July, 2010.  Instagram wouldn't make its debut until October of that year.  I consider myself a pioneer.  

I had 178 posts that year.  Technically, in only half of that year.  

Then, 57 posts in 2011.

Then...

You get the picture.  Facebook.  Instagram.  Even a little Twitter thrown in for good measure. Yet, somehow, writing 140 characters seems more daunting most days than writing 140 words.

And now, magically, as my left eyelid twitches from too little sleep and too much caffeine, I've decided to test the waters of consistent blogging once again at a time in my life that almost GUARANTEES failure.  I've been home on paternity leave for 3 weeks now, and haven't managed to string together 2-3 sentences in less than 1-2 hours without something coming up (or out) that needs tending to.  

Babies are no joke.  I know that sounds trite and flippant, and probably wouldn't make the cut for a teen pregnancy prevention PSA, but that's the truth in its most Twitter-esque form.  I marvel at all those parental bloggers out there that can somehow churn out post after meaningful post, all while carrying their kid in a sling, typing with one hand and sipping freshly squeezed lemonade in the other.  At least, that's the image of them I have in my head most of the time.  

Or maybe it's the image I want to project.

Nailed it.

I don't make any promises going forward, and I'm starting to think this may end up being more therapy than theater, but come on back when you have a few minutes to burn and maybe we can share a laugh or two.