Why write?

Why write? Why do this digital thing called blogging? Why put my thoughts down before others? Good questions.

Though he died in 1968, before anyone thought about using computers to write, Thomas Merton had similar questions. As he says in The Sign of Jonas, "I continue writing this journal under obedience to Dom Gildas, in spite of my personal disinclination to go on with it. It is sufficient to have the matter decided by a director. If it is tedious to keep a journal, it is still more tedious to keep wondering whether or not I ought to give the thing up. I do not know whether it will give glory to God: but my writing of it has been disinfected by obedience. I need no longer apologize either to God or to myself for keeping a journal."

I haven't been commanded to maintain a blog. (Well, my wife, Banu, has strongly urged me to do so!) Sometimes I feel like I have plenty to say, and other times, I'm convinced that if I never produce another word, things would go just as well. So, let's see what happens...