“The bottom line is this: You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can’t, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world. The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way people look at reality, then you can change it . . .  If there is no moral question, there is no reason to write. I’m an old-fashioned writer and, despite the odds, I want to change the world.”

—James Baldwin in The New York Times, September 23, 1979. Photograph, also from 1979, by Brownie Harris.

American author, playwright, and Civil Rights activist James Baldwin, New York, New York, 1979. (Photo by Brownie Harris/Corbis via Getty Images)

I often think about why I feel so compelled to write, to journal, to blog, to remember and record.  I don’t know many others who feel they MUST record the things I record in so many places and in so many ways.  I usually don’t understand it either, but when I read this quote, it felt right to me.  Maybe I do it because I have HOPE.  I hope that maybe someday, someone I love will find my words and read a few of them and smile, or feel better, or feel loved, or see something in a new way.

I hope that my words will express love and hope to those who will follow me.  My children, my grandchildren, my great-grandchildren, and beyond.  I want them to know that whenever they read this, I was thinking of them now, long before, on this cold December day in 2023, always cheering for them, wishing them happiness and wellness and all my love.

I hope my words help you see the world in a good and better way.