[andrew-dc]

There is another important angle to all of this that I have discovered: I began writing/journaling several years ago by hand and have off and on kept up the habit. For me personally, the experience is enjoyable and therapeutic, given my day job is 100% on a computer. (I'm also an illustrator (focus on traditional, rather than digital) so I naturally nerd out on pens, paints, ink, paper, etc. Illustrating with analog tools also has a similar effect as writing.) I have found that I very easily enter flow state writing, for whatever reason.

More importantly, I recently felt inspired (HT to the late Humphrey Carpenter's excellent biography of Tolkien, who wrote to his kids a ton) not just to write for myself, but to write to my sons. This has given my writing even a greater purpose, as I want to give my thoughts (I'm not some profound thinker or such rubbish) and encouragement to my boys when I may not be around (not just in death, but even not near them). I want them to hear and remember the goofiness, and some of the things that went unsaid, or may have been missed, to apologize for my own failings, to really know how much I love and am proud of them. And I want them to not feel alone and discouraged in this world. That sort of stuff. I don't believer there would be anything wrong with typing things to them, however It feels like actually holding a thing that my dad held, and seeing his lines, scribbles, ramblings, bad spelling and stuff...but meant for me...would be really meaningful.