I don’t decorate for the holidays. It’s just me; what’s the point. But I do put my mother’s Christmas decor up — the most important of which, for her, is the nativity scene. Next to it is a patchwork wreath I made for her many years ago, onto which she has strung lights and a bunch of little elves. As I was repositioning the little elves, well, a little irreverence is good for the soul, even — or maybe especially — during these stark winter holidays.

How do you blog, asks Frank Paynter, a huggy bear of a blogger I met at Harvard’s first BloggerCon.
Late at night, usually after midnight, when my almost ninety-year old mother is asleep and I’ve unwound by watching some mindless tv program I’ve taped, then I read my email, trash my spam, check out my son’s new blog. And the NY Times, The Progressive Review, Truthout. And then, maybe, I blog.
But first I turn on the full-spectrum light on the wall near my computer. It’s a blank wall that I face, a white wall with no windows. My big, flat-screened monitor is my window, and the light feeds my illusion of an open space. I sit in my chair, wheel back and forth to loosen my thoughts. It doesn’t always work; I seldom have much energy left for thinking. I wheel back and forth, get up to feed the cat, get a drink of water.
I sit and wheel and watch the screen without the full coffee cup that sustains most bloggers. I don’t drink coffee. I drink tea. But not when I’m blogging
I used to read other weblogs before I posted on my own so that I could join “conversations.” I don’t do that much any more because I don’t have the time and energy to fully participate. I used to leave lots of comments on others’ blogs. I don’t do that very often now either. I liked it when my blogging universe was small and manageable. There’s just so many bloggers out there now, so much, so many. It all overwhelms me.
So, instead, I just sit and blog what I think, what I think about. I blog for me on my own weblog.. I blog to continue putting out connections to family and friends I no longer see much of. I blog for whoever finds me for whatever reason.
I post right into the Moveable Type template that my son set up for me. If it were any more complicated, I wouldn’t bother; but MT and b!X makes it a cinch. I type while I think, without first doing a draft. I try to proofread, but at 1 a.m. or such, I usually miss all kinds of typos. So the next morning, before my mother gets up and needs to be fed, reassured, reminded, recreated, I go in and find and fix them.
And then I go in and trash my comment spam, of which there is a constant flow. Just one more way the blogging universe has become so overwhelming.
How do I blog, Frank Paynter asks. I blog wearily and wishfully. I blog isolated and interested and intentioned.
I blog the way I live.