Me on the page

I am thinking about who I am on paper and who I am in person.  They are two vastly different things. I don't write much about work or my day to day as a deputy public defender handling incompetent clients who are the most mentally ill clients of all.  These are the clients who think they are Jesus or that they are being abducted by aliens.  I am there to protect them and their rights and talk to the doctors and hope the incompetency evaluations come out accurate.  But, I don't write about it because I have no space from it.  Every day is a new day yet the same day in a weird Groundhog Day kind of way and I just try to do my best.  I spend at least eight hours a day, five days a week doing this kind of work, but if you read my blog or my Facebook you would think my day is filled with renovating my house, traveling and going to concerts with my husband.   I don't write about the work not because it's not interesting, but because it is too interesting in the saddest kind of way.

Aside from my work, there are other things I leave off the page.  I try not to write about the squabbles with my husband.  They really are not anything anyone needs to hear.  Doesn't everyone fight about who does what chores, driving (my bad driving) and of course, money?  Occasionally, a fight will be so inane that I have to write about it (for instance, a huge fight we had in New York City over a piece of pizza).

What interests me more is what is in my head.  I think that is how I am so different on the page.  On the page, I am the person I wish I was at times and at other times, I show the person I wish I wasn't.  I look back at old blogs and think, wow, you were a mess.  And I still am a mess.  I have a tendency to wear a jacket with food on the collar or a shirt with a hole in it.  I just don't notice these kind of things.  But I do notice other things.  I notice the homeless guy on the corner and the people coming to court in tattered clothing and the families crying in the hallways.  If I ever fail to notice these things, it is time to retire.

I guess what I am trying to say is that writing for me is my relief, my escape and my haven.  I may not tell you everything dear reader, but I talk about the important stuff: how I still yearn for a child on a daily basis (who am I kidding, probably ten times a day), how I still struggle to moderate my drinking, how I wish my dad was still here so we could go to the casino together and how much I love music and writing.  That is who I am.