Well, good question. These two methods of communicating have historically been closely linked, but with a major difference. Blogs, by definition, are web-oriented. The implication, however, is more of a driver. What is the point of having it on the web? Well, to publicize and share it, of course.

But that’s where I differ from the traditional blog world. I actually don’t care if anyone reads my blog, because for me it really started as a simple journal. Online was chosen because I’m an advocate of the cloud to avoid isolated silos of writing that might be lost to time.

Who is my audience? Well, I am my own audience for one. I have found wisdom, solace, and sometimes angst at looking back at journals and notes I’ve written in the past. Sometimes it’s an “ouch” moment when I realize I was down a wrong turn. Sometimes it’s a validation that I was onto something that just needed more work and more time to evolve or blossom.

The larger audience for me is my family. I have the most amazing siblings and their partners that bring a lot of conversations and debates and thoughts into their own writing and discussions. And I have incredible children with their partners and children that I’ve always adored.

Several years ago, my eldest daughter Erin gave me a nice leather-bound journal and suggested I capture stories in there to be shared someday. Many years ago, several of us got these diaries that went five years out and encouraged each to answer a single question or thought each day of the year. Both of these were useful in pulling together thoughts and acting as a spark to meditation, thought, and reflection.

And my overarching word for much of the project I started in 2024 was “legacy.” A question my dear friend Kevin asked one time is “what legacy are we leaving behind for our kids?” We were talking about music at the time, and we realized that although my best buds and I have probably spent several tens of thousands of hours playing music together and individually, we actually have relatively little to show for it. If I’ve played 30,000 hours of music in my life, why is it that I have a handful of tapes and recordings?

One reason is that much of it simply doesn’t matter, and is just fun and exercising our craft. But another reason is that we don’t always stop to think “what is the part of all this that warrants leaving a record behind?” Perhaps none of it, and I’m just making noise on a guitar and singing to hear myself.

But I don’t believe that’s actually true. Even though I don’t spend time re-reading the books and articles and letters written by my parents and siblings and ancestors, I read them from time to time, and realize they are some record of our time here on earth. Most importantly, I would give almost anything to have more recordings and more writings and more memories of those who have gone on before us. To understand them. To understand the world. To understand ourselves better.

So, the “legacy project” I began in 2024 came out of all that, and resulted in my 2025 efforts to capture stories within the family, genealogy and family history that extends more broadly, and this blog that I hope will allow me to capture a couple different streams of thought: public posts about life and politics and philosophy and nature and whatever else; and private posts meant for the family only.

For the family knowledge, pics, and stories, I created a wiki that is restricted to family members. For broader stories dealing with family history, I created a public wiki called LewisArchives.org where I can scan and post the historical documents and photos and stories of ancestors for the small but passionate genealogy community as well as family members should they care about ancestry at any point in their own lives. And for photo storage, I chose to put up a photo repository on LewisArchives.org as well that will allow me and family members to share big collections of photos without having to worry about them being mined by AI tech bros like Google and Apple and Microsoft, and can be funded to last many years in the future.

So is it a blog or a journal? Well, both. Different threads for different purposes for different audiences.