Brick by Brick

I've been remiss in updating my blog, I know, I know. I want to write about everything, but that seems so daunting, so then I don't write anything. But I have a new philosophy now: a little bit at a time. Isn't that the great thing about this day and age anyway? Technology is totally supportive of people with ADD. I can write a little bit at a time, not have to bother fleshing out an idea, and you, dear reader, don't mind, because you're reading something on a website, which was specificially designed to appeal to all of our short attention spans. Perfect!

So my musing for today is this:

The other day, while passing a wall being built in Red Hook, I told N that sometimes I wished I was a bricklayer. I think it would be nice to work on something so tangible. To spread the cement, lay down the brick just so, add more cement, another brick, and so on until you have a wall. Wouldn't it be great to spend a day working on something and be able to see something so (literally) concrete when you're done? To turn around as you're walking to the subway and see your wall? The wall you built? I'm sure it would be hard, physically demanding work, but it's got to be satisfying.

So, I said all this to N. I think he thought I was a bit strange, though he himself has often talked about wanting a job that was fundamentally about craft more than anything else. Then, a few days later, I was reading an interview with a novelist who happens to be the daughter of David McCullough, the historian, and she said that he told her that being a writer was a lot like being a bricklayer--each day you lay down a few words, and before you know it you have a wall. (Am I mixing metaphors?)

Anyway, I took that as a sign, that I would announce one day I wanted to be a bricklayer, and then read a few days later that a prolific, Pulitzer-prize-winning author compared his own craft to bricklaying. So from now on, this blog is my wall, and hopefully it will get me in practice for building other walls, like chick-lit walls, and health policy walls, and other walls that I've been building in my head for years but have never had the discipline, or stamina, or focus, or....whatever it is....to get down on paper.