My thanks to Cynthia D’Angelo for introducing me to the National Blog Posting Month challenge (NaBloPoMo). I’ve missed a few days during the month, but felt it was better to miss a day when writing just didn’t fit rather than just post a random piece of drivel to check a box.
I’m going to keep up the blogging habit the way I do with exercise – not necessarily every day, but enough to notice some improvement in my writing and thinking. Just today I was spending time with some friends who are parents of middle-schoolers (plus one private school teacher) and the Common Core came up in discussion. These are fairly well-educated parents, involved with their children’s education, and had no idea what Common Core was really about (and had a good idea that they should be somewhat skeptical of media hype, pro and con). Whatever you think of the Common Core, you probably agree that it’s been a PR nightmare. More fodder for writing and thinking, though.
The guitar build continues – I’m closing in on some exciting operations that will start to make it look more like a guitar and less like an assemblage of parts. With my 50th birthday approaching next year I’m starting to salivate over a wood bike frame from Renovo Bicycles. I’d also like to get more regular practice with wood (including getting back to turning) into my semi-daily routine – insights from woodworking formed the foundations of this blog.
Watching two 7th graders progress through school – with their diametrically opposite approaches to homework, learning, effort, trial-and-error, mistakes, you name it – continues to ground a lot of what I’ve read and studied over the years. I’m sure one or the other will be making cameo appearances in future posts.
Overall, it’s been a positive experience to start (re)developing my voice and writing. I could have kept a lot of these posts confined to a private journal, but exposing my thoughts to the public does provide a gentle incentive to sharpen things up a bit. The fact that the audience has been more or less indifferent to the writing is also helpful – it’s like playing music at a party where everybody is more focused on their conversation than they are to the performance. But there have been a few commentators who have provided feedback, and for that I’m grateful.
Until next time…
The Learning Curve 
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