January 1st - Writing Resolution

Resolutions - do they do any good?  I'm not sure, but they are worth trying, because they obviously point to something that we want to fix, or at least something we think we are supposed to want to fix.  I want to be creative, so I resolve to write every day.  Is that because I really do want to write, or is it because I've selected writing as a key part of the identity I want?  Do I just want people to think of me as a writer, because I like writers and reading, because my mother and grandmother were writers, and because I think people would think I am interesting and smart if I'm a writer?

I don't know yet, but maybe I'll find out if I actively try to keep my resolution.

WARNING: MEANDERING THOUGHTS AHEAD. 

I haven't posted to LiveJournal in some time, or posted blogs on my other sites.  I've been too busy with work and my baby and my marriage, all the financial challenges of moving to Oakland from Santa Cruz for a promotion that didn't bring enough of a raise to offset the added expenses. It's ridiculous, but I feel committed to sticking it out for a while, for a variety of factors.  I've worked here for many years, but I don't know if I can afford to keep working here, the way things stand now.   

I hope writing regularly will help me focus on other opportunities, maybe encourage me to explore that technical writing path I've always considered; I also hope to re-center a part of myself in a process that makes me feel satisfied (that being said, I kind of hate everything I've written up until now, at least parts of everything).  I want to tell stories, but I'm not sure I know how.  I want to practice writing, and I want to sharpen my writing, and I want to experiment and see what stories I can tell.  I want to chisel words on a page that will seem to have meaning behind them.  Far too much of my writing seems pretentious and overly clever.  I want to strip it down, but at the same time I can't resist florid writing. 

Please forgive me if you read these over the next year.  This will be treated like a journal, as a place to start my writing each day, like warm-up exercises.  Some may be interesting.  Some may be rambling. 

Does any of that make sense?

Writing thoughts for a story:

Princess goes through a mirror into a land that is turned inside out.  What triggered the change reflected by the experience in the mirror?  What broke down the status quo?  What does any of that even me? 

We write about death, but characters in a story can never truly die because you can always turn back to an earlier page, or rewind the movie.  Is that why we write?