In my not quite blank journal {Just Write}

I haven't stopped writing because I've run out of things to say. It's the opposite, really. There's too much, a million layers of crystal white words, an avalanche gathering. If I begin, the words could bury me.

And there's no time, either. If I could scribble while I run, type while I drive, you'd be turning the pages of my book by now. But since that sort of multi-tasking is frowned upon, every page in my journal is clean. Well, except for the page where my daughter wrote.

She told me, "I like to use my imagination wildly," and then she invited me to her secret society. She wrote the invitation in my otherwise clean journal. It turns out her imaginary name is Hermione, and the society is all about freeing the house elves. Ok then, it's possible her imagination likes to borrow just a bit of wildness from Rowling's. As it turns out, the only words in my otherwise clean journal may be slightly plagiarized.

I'm glad she's supportive of freeing the house elves, particularly since whenever we play Harry Potter, I'm usually playing the part of Dobby while washing dishes or doing laundry. (This is the sort of multi-tasking I can actually pull off.) Sometimes I make her laugh by pretending to smash myself on the head with a pot. While my pretend-Hermione snorts with laughter, I shoot a look at her older brother (who sometimes interjects as Professor Snape when he wants to annoy us). My look says to him: See! I'm pretty funny! Not nearly as uncool as you make me out to be. Then I remember that I am playing the part of a house elf--doing it quite well in fact--and realize that perhaps I am exactly as uncool as he makes me out to be.


I can live with that. I can live with being uncool if it makes my daughter laugh. And I can live with almost-blank journals and dormant blogs and unwritten books. I can do it quite well, in fact.