Seven years, 750 thousand hits. 25 thousand comments. 7400 posts.
It ain't a book, but I always said I'm a writer, not an author.
Was it as good for you as it was for me?
Cobb has accomplished about six missions for me. It has given me a stupendous sense of achievement. And even though it's sometimes just me sitting in my underwear in a hotel room thousands of miles from home, like I am tonight, Cobb has always been a thoughtful place to be.
Back about three years ago I put it down and published a retrospective. I think I've grown a great deal since then. But certainly my proudest moments were winning the Aaron Hawkins Award and a bunch of other stuff I can't think of at all.
Cobb has allowed me to work through all of my issues and questions about American society and politics, and I think it has made me once again into the kind of person I once was - a humble person who listened intently to people with the genuine ability to be amazed by their stories. It has given me a way to be passive yet intensely moral which is a very difficult balance that used to put me in people's faces. I think most importantly and more recently it has allowed me to age gracefully, to accept being the older man that I will soon be when I turn 50 and drop this puppy. It has allowed me to care in public and engage as a citizen, to teach and to learn, to facilitate reflection and to clarify, to fight melodramatically and to celebrate matters of the spirit.
I realize that these are odd things to expect from electronic publication, and so I'm an odd fish, but I feel that I am in communion with thinkers and men of letters throughout history. In short, it has been a great 7 years.
And so it continues.
