The Ideal Blog Reader

Yesterday I met my ideal reader.

I am thinking of the ideal reader of this blog, not my fiction. I may be speaking of you.

In a place unrelated to the publishing business, someone I don’t know well walked over to me and told me she reads my blog, and loves it. She went on to say some of the most moving words about my writing to have crossed my tickertape. And then she added: “You’re funny too.”

Mind you, she is a busy, productive and accomplished woman. Because she likes this blog, I will add that she is sensitive as well, and has good taste.

And she is not an editor or an agent, nor does she write fiction or buys children’s books. She is not one of the ‘followers’ or ‘Like button clickers,’ or anyone I would have remotely imagined to have a reason to come here.

She likes my writing, that’s all. The ideal reader.

This got me thinking about our readers, the ones we don’t know and would not have guessed we speak to. We read and see movies about the creepy kind. Not much about the sane and the good. We know the ones we know. The others are beyond the sea, where we know there are souls but the naked eye can’t see.

And then, for one brief moment, I remembered the other reason I write. In the roaring traffic’s boom, beyond the confines of my lonely room, I think of you, the reader.

©Painting by Shelagh Duffett

©Happy Valentine’s Day©