why we blog

rosie blogs
just like me
she writes in odd verse
without punctuation
or editing for typos or grammar
spewing random thoughts
like a hyped-up toddler
with multiple personalities
or attention deficit
sometimes switching
between several topics
as disparate as
the birth of her baby girl
and her american idol crushes
and the cruelty of war
in the same confessing breath.

rosie’s words spill out
overflowing and abundant
seemingly without rhyme
no method to her madness
and yet it all is very clear
at least to me
there is a fundamental need
to be heard
even while we hide
there is a wish
to be known
even when we do not know ourselves
there is a compulsion
to make sense
out of what is mostly senseless
goddamit, i get it.

we blog about the same things
rosie and me
babies, celebrity, art
news, gossip, rants
work, play, family
movies, music, tv
obsession, depression, confession
want, need, desire
blue, yellow, red
the mundane
and the universal
the intimate
and the exaggerated
the personal
and the professional
so welcome to my world, rosie
come on in and take a seat
i hope you stay here for a bit.

i used to dream about rosie
don’t laugh, it’s true
in my dreams i’d hang out
with rosie and madonna
and plan playdates for our kids
just three creative chicks
talking about our dead parents
and about growing up
in large catholic families
where guilt was god
and we were too small
to understand
why death came so soon
it was easy to get lost
in the noise and confusion
of large households
our silence was welcome
still we longed to be heard
to be seen
to be loved.

madonna, rosie, and me
at the end of the day
strip away all the bullshit
and we’re just three moms
we find ourselves there
in our babies’ eyes
in their beauty
in their innocence
in their adoration
it all begins to make sense
this is why we are here
nothing else matters
our art and ambition
cannot compete
nothing can
with them life is messy
and yet they simplify our lives
as much as they complicate
because of them
we stopped running
from who we were
and embrace whatever
pain and joy are companions
life’s conjoined twins
we no longer fear the dark
now that we have seen
the resplendent light.

i used to be jealous of rosie
i wanted my own talk show
my own magazine
my own memoir
invitations to the parties
and to be famously adored
but i remained invisible
a player on a small stage
just another opinionated blogger
a part-time columnist
and sometime filmmaker
with a full-time day and night job
as an anonymous soccer mom
and desperate suburban housewife
with too much dirty laundry
and too little time
to tend to my own dreams
or career ambitions
meanwhile rosie became exposed
and then overexposed
like the drunken party crasher
who stayed too long
and revealed too much
she got way more
than she ever really wanted
and so she retreated
walked away from it all
the money, glory, fame
she stopped talking on our tv’s
but she couldn’t stay quiet for long
can i blame her

rosie’s blog calls out to me
with its unsophisticated simplicity
and its undeniable originality
it is an explosion of creativity
with a voice that is both angry
and yet at peace
she is different
this rosie without a publicist
raw and uncensored
without makeup and hair
rambling and honest
complex and disjointed
passionate and inspired
there is more to her
than meets the eye
isn’t that true of us all
blogging is the conduit
between our brains and the universe
it is an invisible connection
our letter to the world
we blog because we must
there isn’t a choice.

blogging is the great equalizer
or so they say
allowing us all
people from all walks of life
celebrity and non-celebrity
to share our thoughts as freely
and as publicly as the others
few of us doing it for money
in fact we pay for the privilege
although i’m not naive
even in this world
the celebrity blogger
is more celebrated
than the non-celebrity blogger like me
yet the distance between us
seems small
less glaring
and less daunting
thus making anything possible
blogging is the key
it opens doors
unlocks buried treasures
making us guests
in strangers homes

we meet on an imaginary playground
a simple place
with so many functions
through our blogs we
acquaint, advertise, advise, announce,
betray, break, build, broadcast,
contact, convey, correspond,
declare, disclose, discover,
disseminate, divulge, enlighten,
impart, imply, inform, interact, interface,
let on, let out, link, network,
pass on, proclaim, publicize, publish,
reach out, relate, report, reveal,
spread, state, suggest,
tell, touch base, transfer, transmit
as the world expands
it also gets smaller
somehow we are now interlinked
by much less than six degrees
rosie and me
through our words
through the blogosphere
two bloggers
two moms
two daughters
two citizens
two artists
two souls
two writers
two women.