He Would Have Made a Great Blogger

At some point in his adult life, my father, the late Hanno Fuchs, began writing down his thoughts and ideas on 3 by 5 index cards. They ranged from random observational tidbits, to ideas for longer pieces about the political state of the planet. If I'm not mistaken, my stepmother, Judy Fuchs, is in possession of some of these notes, along with earlier writings of his, going back to his army days as a psychological propoganda writer ("Psychprop," as they called it) during the Korean War.

His gift for writing, and for thinking, really, are evident in those early pieces. I'll reach out to Judy and ask for copies, so that I can look them over once again, in order to get a sense of how my father was thinking about the world when he wrote those notes. In today's world, the little blue cards might have been "tweets," and the longer, typewritten pages could have appeared on blogspot.com or some other similar venue.

The thought begs the question, however, of whether or not my father ever intended his notes to be read by anyone other than himself. I have no doubt he craved an audience -- he was a writer by trade, after all; but he also knew a lot about the editing and revision process. And anyone I've ever known who considers himself or herself a writer cares a great deal about the careful tweaking of a piece. Often they're quite stingy about when they consider a piece to be "ready" for public consumption. Perhaps he'd cringe at how readily I spit these little First Drafts onto the computer screen for God's Green Earth to see.

Or maybe he'd just find it to be really fucking cool.

It occurs to me now that, either way, I once again follow in my father's footsteps. He was navel-gazing long before this guy was even a notion in his formidable mind.