It began with my research into troubling questions about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, its history and truth claims. I had a desire to write down my thoughts and discuss them with others. So I began writing and then decided I wanted to blog. Writing was one thing. I may not write well, but I know how to write and I enjoy doing it. Blogging is something else entirely. I don’t have any idea how to blog. So I started talking to people, listening to podcasts, watching YouTube and reading tutorials and soon my mind is going like this:
- What’s a web host? A content management system? How do I choose and install a theme? What is SEO? What are backlinks? Help! I have the computer skills of a typical grandma!
- I need to get head-shots taken for a profile picture. Wait! I would need to lose 25 pounds first!
- Can I use photographs that I copy from the web? The pictures I take are blurry, cut off people’s heads, and contain my finger. I should take a photography class!
- How do I maximize my social media presence, install analytics, monetize, or use keywords?
Now I am completely overwhelmed; I want to do it right, but I have no idea what I’m doing. Then last Friday while coming home from my morning walk, I notice the crocuses in a neighbor’s yard. This particular patch of colorful beauties has come back each year for maybe thirty years, and I’ve enjoyed them as one of the first signs of spring. 
Then I noticed the flowers in the yard across the street, some of the sorriest, most distressed silk flowers ever. I think they might have looked okay when someone first poked them into the flowerbed, but now they call attention to themselves as frauds and pretenders. As I thought about these contrasting floral displays, I noticed how many flower beds had no flowers at all so early in the spring—just bare ground, encroaching weeds, or last year’s decaying remains.
I realized that I need to be genuine. All the things that were filling my thoughts and making me question whether to even try to start a blog aren’t things that really matter to me. Many aren’t even things I was aware of the week before. I want to write about my ideas and maybe create a venue to discuss them with others. I know that trying to be something I’m not isn’t going to be sustainable. 
Even when those silk flowers were new, there had to be those who immediately recognized them as fakes. I have enough insight to know that if I worry too much about trying to do it right, I’ll get stuck in the details and end up doing nothing, like so many good ideas that never amount to anything.
Being real is scary. I’ve watched those crocuses bloom and then fade, at times lovely and at others straggly and fading. Some years they are covered in snow, destroyed by hail, trampled by careless feet, or—as is a serious problem in my neighborhood—eaten by deer. But at least they are real, and I think that is what makes them attractive and interesting—to people and hungry deer.
So I’m just going to do this blog and put it out there with a header picture that I took with my iPhone on that Friday walk, a profile picture that is clearly cropped from a family photo, and numerous other faults and failings. I don’t claim to know what I’m doing. I’m just Jana trying something new and hoping to grow.
Please comment or leave me a message with your thoughts and suggestions.
