Thoughts

I am taking a grad. class this semester called Traditions of Written Rhetoric. Basically, it's a course that traces the history of rhetoric from the Ancient Greeks up to modern day philosophers and orators. What is rhetoric you say? Well, let's just say it's the ability to persuade others using language or discourse.

Why am I telling you this? Because we've been discussing some interesting ideas that I find applicable to my life, and it involves this blog. Writing this blog has been a great way to remember happenings and experiences. It's been wonderful to be able to share moments from mine and Logan's day, expressing some of the thoughts, feelings, and ideas that I've had.

However, in many ways, this blog is artificial, an imagined creation, a rhetorical tool in which I portray a vision of what staying at home with Logan is like. And what's bugging me about my blog is that it doesn't tell "the truth."

I'm not lying or anything, merely using words to create a reality that isn't, well, reality. I'm being rhetorical and using my powers of persuasion to gain sympathy, incite laughs, and simply connect. No matter how hard I try my experience of living life with baby can't ever fully be encapsulated through words. The power of writing only scratches at the surface of reality, and this can be a frustrating thing if you dwell on it too much.

For example, over the past three days Logan has woken up in the morning with his diaper full of poop. Have I mentioned this before? No. Should I be mentioning it now? Probably not. Waking up poopy caused all sorts of thoughts and feelings inside of me: "how long has he been like this? I'm terrible for not getting him at the first whimper. Man this is gross...is this what my life has become? Wow, I love life and I love Logan and I even love changing his diaper. What did he eat? Etc. Etc."

These thoughts could have made it into the blog, but I chose to leave them out (actually I just put them in, but you get what I'm saying). Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that so much of life at home is missing, left out because it's not important enough or I can't express it properly or I think it would be boring or I feel as though no one wants to hear or read about it.

Good writers are able to expand these everyday moments and reveal some of the depth that every moment in life possesses. Right now at 11:11 a trillion things are happening. Present. A clock is ticking and my laptop is humming and the keys of my laptop are clicking and I'm breathing but not really aware of my breath and my butt is sort of sore and a truck passed by my house and Logan is stirring and all sorts of stuff is happening that I'm not even aware of.

So, enough rambling. My blog, Daddy is Home, is not the truth. It's a collection of parts of the truth that I stitch together in order to make something pretty and wholesome and interesting. I could go back each day and write something completely different for that day and it would still not get at the whole truth.

Where are we at now? Well, all I know is that the power of words and rhetoric is pretty neat and I'm still enjoying exploring. Hopefully I haven't turned off too many readers with this lengthy post. I was a bit bored and lonely during Logan's nap so decided to blab. Was it in a persuasive way? Did you follow any of what I said or am I headcase who needs to get outside? It is 60 degrees outside...wake up Logan! Daddy needs to go for a walk!