Between online stuff, books, magazines and journals, I probably do as much non-work-related reading each day as anybody does who also has a day job. I am a rapid reader, except when something forces me to ponder or imagine - or to look something up.
I appreciate a good information-conveyor, whether the info is news, opinions, deep-thinking, alcohol-inspired insights, personal musings and experiences, or plain information of all sorts, including the profoundly-informed and most widely-knowledgeable.
The websites which I frequent are all quite competent - or extremely good - at doing this. There is a definite craft to the pithy, linking, mini-essay (or mini-rant) whether the style is graceful, ironic, lyrical, obsessive, humorous, sly, academic, somber, crude, or whatever. We do not claim to have mastered the craft, but we aspire to do so.
However, real writing is a much rarer, God-given talent to which we would not even presume to aspire. Off the top of my head, I can only think of three website folks I read regularly who are true writers: Sippican (an explorer of mysteries and the creator of the felicitous term "intertubes"), Vanderleun (the often world-weary blogger and poet manque), and Iowahawk, the diabolical mimic, satirist and one-time Presidential candidate who skims the surface of reality before rising above it like a swallow chasing bugs over a lake.
This from Iowahawk's recent treatment of Andrew Sullivan, Dial "M" for Maternity:
I let the Ruger down slowly and put on the safety. Ma Palin was a Northside moll who had worked her way to the top of the Christianist syndicate. She was too violent and stupid for the Ivy League, but she was an expert at the two things that got you made in her gang -- shooting guns and making babies. I had long suspected some of those babies were fakes. If I could prove it, it would spark an internal war among the Christianists -- and bring down their iron-fisted control of the marriage rackets.
"I'm all ears... what did you say your name was?"
"I didn't."
"Suit yourself. Now let's hear that nursery story."
Well, whatever kind of writing one produces, every post needs a hook of some sort because the Hook brings you back. Here's my Hook for this post:
It doesnt matter what I say
So long as I sing with inflection
That makes you feel that Ill convey
Some inner truth of vast reflection
But Ive said nothing so far
And I can keep it up for as long as it takes
And it dont matter who you are
If Im doing my job then its your resolve that breaks
Because the hook brings you back
I aint tellin you no lie
The hook brings you back
On that you can rely
