Writing is more than putting letters, words, sentences, paragraphs, and thoughts  together.

Writing is expressive self-revelation.  It is an unveiling of the unseen, often hidden, and not fully understood self to the world.

Writing is the liberation of one’s self from one’s self.  It is the throwing open of a window to freshen the air of one’s life.  It is the opening of a door to welcome in friends and strangers for a conversation about the contents of one’s soul.

Writing is the public expression of the unknown self, an autobiographical press release of the unseen events of your heart and mind.

I have not written for personal pleasure for three months.  My close friends know this is not a good sign for me.  It means that I have batten-down the hatches, tucked in my head, and burrowed my way through the sludge of daily life.  It means I have been in a self-protective mode, unwilling, and perhaps, unable, to let others see my soul.

One of the reasons I titled this blog Reclamation316 is because I have found that if I am not writing, it means I have lost my way.  It means the soil of my life has become stale and contaminated, sterilized of feeling and emotion, generally unproductive and non-relational.

Writing is the way in which I reclaim my life.  When I write I am making the statement This is me! This is Rus!

Writing is not a boasting that I am right and you are wrong.  Rather, it is the laying out of the stakes that define who I am, today.  You may neither like nor agree with where I stand in the depths of my soul.  I understand.  I write neither for affirmation nor for acceptance.

In fact, there are times when I am displeased with the state of my soul.  I find myself disagreeable to myself.  In these states of internal constipation and indigestion, writing becomes a laxative, a working out of the ambivalences at battle deep within my soul.

Thus, I have committed myself to write regularly, again.  I need to reclaim my soul, to let in fresh air, and to pull back the curtain letting you see me again.

If I stop writing regularly, please send me a get well card or a note of encouragement because when I do not write it means all is not well with my soul or that the world’s ill have driven me into a hole.