Long Time Gone

When I planned an image for this blog, my Google search came up with everything from the erstwhile Dixie Chicks, to Meg Ryan, to the guy who plays Ben in J.J.Abram's "Revolution" television series.  They all fit.

Oh, and the Civil Wars. But I hear they're back now.

I guess that's about right. They're all people who've been long time gone in one capacity or another. And well, come to think of it, most of us go through long time gones.

This blog for instance.

You'll notice that I bravely wrote during the first and second weeks of this school semester, only to tragically drop off ('tragically" is relative, I suppose) the interface of the ethernet, only to sheepishly reappear like a chronic Lazarus who is always smelling of grave clothes.

I decided to briefly blog this morning because I was on Donald Miller's Storyline Blog, which led me to a guest blog by a girl, which led me to her blog, and I got itchy and convicted about her writing story, so I tapped over to my own link in order to plunk away for a few minutes.

The girl was inspiring, talking about all the excuses she had created to  NOT write, only to bravely begin again. It was simple, sweet, and humble, but unapologetic.

I've noticed that people who blog spend at least 10 percent of time apologizing for not blogging. Odd. As if we have an avid populace who is weeping and wailing and gnashing their teeth when we fail to live up to our social network responsibilities, real or assumed. This is beginning to strike me as fairly arrogant or even narcissistic, maybe even hypocritical. To my mind, if you don't want to write, don't, if you do want to write and haven't/can't/don't make the time, well then that's between you and your Maker. The rest of us have been too busy watching YouTubes to notice your absence.

Fer realz.

So I don't write to apologize, because it seems really silly to apologize to anyone other than God on this intensely personal matter. But whenever I do pick up writing after a delayed-flight period, I do want to write about the delay. Perhaps it'll encourage someone else that redemption is never far away, new beginnings may well, begin, whenever you want them, and if you ever believed that you're an absolutely, positively consistent person, go read the book of Leviticus and be reminded that no human is. Inconsistencies, hypocrisies, and failings are normal. Thankfully, so is grace and redemption.





Like writing. Like art. Like a good editor, old things are made new everyday. And even when you've been a long time gone, homecomings begin merely with the turning around.