Tuesday, April 19, 2011

P is for Perfect Sand

I thought I'd take the opportunity today to explain the name of my blog (and twitter handle).

On an unusually warm early November day, my best friend and I were playing in her neighbor's sandbox (she had the awesome above-ground pool, swing set, and basketball court, but her neighbors had the sand!) We began filtering the sand, trying to get rid of twigs and rocks and anything else that marred its consistency. We spent hours in that box. (We were also prone to set up museums, obstacle courses, and pen collections). We decided that every November 9th would be "Perfect Sand Day," dedicated to the removal of imperfections in a sand box. I don't remember if we ever celebrated our made-up holiday again.

More than ten years later, I wrote a story (quoted at the top of my blog) in which an eight-year-old character makes "perfect sand" in her own backyard.

Five years after that, when I decided to create a blog to hold my pictures and track my journey as I figure out what I want to do with my life, that name--"perfect sand"--just came back to me. It ties both to my nostalgia for childhood and my writing life. What could be better?

How about you? What led you to choose your handle or blog name?

2 comments:

george rede said...

Love the story of Perfect Sand. What a great way to literally and figuratively dedicate yourself to the removal of imperfections. Not sure there's a better metaphor for writing and editing!

My blog name, Rough and Rede, came from a simple desire to help people pronounce my last name. After a lifetime of hearing people say "Reed" or "Reedy" I figured there was no way could miss Rough and "Ready".

AJSutts said...

My social media/chatboard identiy came into being when I first had access to gmail years ago. A and j are my first and middle initials, while Sutts was a nickname I had all throughout school. It just made sense to combine them, and as a result, became a nice, simple handle to use. I like having one identity for all my social media accounts.