Every so often it occurs to me that I need to restate what my journal is all about, why I write and why I put it online. I do this for the same reason I write about anything else, to see it fully formed, in order to decide whether or not it makes sense to me. Sometimes I think as I write, and sometimes I write and then think. And then rewrite, or write again.

I lost something when I took my journal and put it online. I gained a lot, too, probably more than I lost. Definitely more than I lost. But I lost something.

A lot of what I write here is my attempt to sort out how I feel about what's going on in my life. That's what I did in my private journal, the one seen by no one and locked away in a hidden directory on my hard drive.

But I also used that private journal to work out my feelings about what was happening to other people, people close to me. Everything I knew about them, or heard about them, and everything they said to me, would go into the journal. Private things I couldn't possible publish to the wide world, or even the tiny corner of it populated by the discerning readers of this page.

I've never kept bunt sign secret from anyone, except the people I work with. I haven't always volunteered the URL to everyone I met, but when it comes up I talk freely about it. I want the people who know me to read it, along with anyone else who for whatever reason gets something out of my daily scribbling.

But I've made some rules for myself, and one of those rules is that I don't tell stories about people without their permission. I don't go into the morbid details of family arguments, big or small, or the stresses that tear people apart on the outside, or rip them up on the inside.

That leaves little to write about, other than my own relatively cloistered existence. I've given away more than I ever thought I would about the petty details of my days and nights. I think you can know me pretty well from reading my journal. There really isn't much more to me than what you'll find on these pages. If there's anything I've left out, it's more by neglect than design, probably something that didn't even occur to me to include.

I've talked about religion (raised Catholic, now fully lapsed), politics (bleeding heart liberal), relationships (none that could be called successful). You've seen my violent mood swings, almost on a daily basis. I've let my sappy romantic side have free rein whenever the feeling moved me. I've also been petty and bitchy and whiny, and almost immediately remorseful about it.

Even in the entries that seem to be nothing more than a rundown of my daily routine, I try to put something more into the words I release into the ether. I don't always succeed, but I do try. And that's pretty much how things are going to stay around here, except that maybe I'll try a little harder. Or try to try harder, at least.

When it feels right to me, I'll let the people I love flow through my keyboard onto your monitor. I'll write about the times I spend with them, or the big moments in their lives. I might embarrass them sometimes, but I'll never intentionally hurt them. That's just not in me. If that makes me less of a writer than others who are more forthcoming, then so be it. I'm at peace with everything I've written in bunt sign, and I intend to keep it that way.