I made it to one hundred! 100. The Big One-Oh-Oh.
This is my 100th blog post. It took a while. I started blogging in 2011 and made six blog posts that year. For the first nine years, I only published 51.
From my very first blog post, May 11, 2011: “How to start a blog about end-of-life decisions? I have been professionally dealing with these issues for 27 years.… One thing for certain . . . the fact that patients and families often struggle with decisions about medical treatment at the end of life will not go away.”
(BTW, shout out to Kelly Brachle, of Quality of Life Publishing Co., who edits my ramblings into a coherent thought. And while I am shouting out, nothing leaves our home without the approval of my wife as she stands in for the “average reader” [when I showed her this post, she reminded me she is “above average”]. More than once, her suggestions have saved me some embarrassment.)
It’s all about the stories — family, friends, wilderness
Although I often stick to the theme of making end-of-life decisions, other topics get some attention. I share my own family’s experience with death and dying, like with my mom’s decline and death in “How did your mom feel about her dementia?” Grief is a repeated theme, like my recent post on the funeral ritual for my brother 42 years after he died.
I really try to tell stories, like the post about my friend who died with dementia. I wrote about our friendship since junior high and how we fished together in the years before his death. Occasionally, I share my adventures in the wilderness, like the one about my love of swamps.
I have been writing my whole adult life – before the days of the blog. A few of those older writings made it into the collection. I reprinted a story about riding my bicycle the length of the Outer Banks from a 1993 newsletter published by the nursing home where I was chaplain. For several years following a difficult time in my life, I sent letters (essays, really) to family and friends. In a 2014 post, I shared a piece I did in 1998 about my friend, mentor, and author, Elizabeth O’Connor.
Writing and videos for short attention spans
We have become a people with short attention spans, so I try to limit each post to about 500 words. I have even ventured into producing two-minute videos on various topics. Sometimes I’ll tell the same story in both formats. I did a blog about the lesson my father taught me about letting go in the blog “How to get to ‘It doesn’t Matter!’” I then did a YouTube video about the same story.
By the way, you can subscribe to my YouTube channel and look through my “Hank’s Deep Thoughts” playlist.
I have found that writing for others helps me think things through. I can clarify thoughts in my mind when I have to explain things in a way others can understand. So even if no one else reads these, I will keep on writing these blog posts.
Oops! I just passed 500 words. Bye!
