I started this blog at the beginning of the year without a specific purpose other than to sharpen a mind grown dull. Daily obligations and routine have made an imprint on me for the past three years, and not for the better. I find I'm not as good as I should be at fatherhood or marriage, the quality of my work has suffered, and I'm enduring rather than really living. I had hopes that the blog, by forcing my thoughts out in public, would infuse new clarity into my thinking and raise the level of my game. (I don't know whether or not it actually has.)

My mood has also veered from grim to melancholy ever since the September 11 massacre, waiting for an unspecified Other Shoe to drop. This was never intended to be a war blog, but it became a way to vent my opinions without inflicting them upon my family. There was also a personal conceit involved, that by my own stand on Speaker's Corner I could somehow atone for my complete irrelevance to the great and urgent mission (dare I say crusade?) of our time.

I never expected (or cared) to earn anything other than the occasional intangible reward for blogging effort -- a permalink here, an argument or attaboy there. They're nice when they happen. Still, I have come to the realization that here I am redundant. The blogosphere is full of better, smarter, wittier, and more sensible minds than mine (many of whom were linked here), and anything I might say has already been said better elsewhere. It's time to redirect my own efforts back into the business of life.