Here We Go Again

This space has been quiet for a few days as I’ve been wrestling with a decision about Make the Journey Fun and whether or not to continue publishing here.

I started this blog a little over two years ago. At the time, it was part travel guide for friends and part therapy for me. Along the way, it has introduced me to new friends, has given me a daily responsibility to publish something, and has evolved into broader topics and a larger collection of pictures and ideas that basically cover all the random things about the world that I enjoy.

It will never be a business and I’m good with that. In fact, everything I do here flies in the face of all the blogging experts who say that you should only publish what helps the reader or that posts should have headlines like “Five things to do before a road trip.”

I do none of this, instead opting to write the kind of stories that I enjoy reading. And oddly enough, I’ve found a loyal following of people who seem to enjoy the purely random things that I pull out of my hat each day.

I won’t claim that what I do here is work. It’s more or less a quick, down and dirty exercise in storytelling that forces me to respect a deadline and to not obsess over the finer points of what I’m doing. It’s fun.

Sadly, the world seems like an extraordinarily dark place right now as people prefer strife and controversy to happy stories and pretty pictures. They opt for a thirty second video over a two minute read or, worse yet, to just read a headline or comments before forming an opinion and moving on. It’s starting to feel like no one wants to read, think or even be happy.

I don’t know about you, dear reader, but all of the bickering and the destruction of social constructs that I hold dear are enough to make me want to slit my wrists with a rusty razor blade. The ugliness is exhausting and it isn’t going away.

It makes me wonder if there’s still a call for those pretty pictures and random stories that I enjoy sharing. Maybe not. Maybe I just write for me and hope that the positive influence helps at least one person.

Maybe it’s time to close up shop, delete the blog and spend more time alone and offline.

The answer isn’t clear to me just yet.

However, an email from a friend who liked a picture and a message from Christine thanking me for a book recommendation bolstered my spirits, at least a little. Perhaps there is still a desire for something light in this sea of negativity that consumes us. The best I can do at this point is to be me and hope it’s good enough.

So here we go again.

Have a good weekend, friends. It’s a long weekend for some of us. Turn off social media, breathe some fresh air, move your body, embrace the light and do something fun.