I can't help needing to write. I also can't seem to help that I start to care too much about who's reading, or obligating myself to write for some arbitrary goal, or that I start feeling weighed down by my need to be an outlier. It happens, I'm over it, and you never knew it existed. Another problem is that I'm great at content (or, so I feel); but, I keep missing the hook. I had a hook once, but it was very specific to World of Warcraft - a) I don't play WoW any longer; and b) I don't want to limit any potential readership. Maybe I've found a hook this time, maybe I've missed it, maybe I've started to realize that it doesn't matter quite so much. I'm not writing for attention (this time), I'm writing because that creative steam pressure valve is popping and I need to let it all out or I'm gonna explode.
Also, I've found a love for the Ruby scripting language, and there may come a time in the near future when I can take this blog and put it to practical use with improving Ruby skills. Maybe. Or maybe I should worry about tidying this place up first and making it more presentable to company.
The premise is VERY loosely attempting to consolidate everything I'm enjoying in a variety of mediums. We all have favorite music; maybe a favorite movie, or television show; some of us still enjoy to read. I'm going to attempt pulling these together into a perspective that really does nothing more than lets you get to know me through my experiences. I can't even promise that it'll always stay on topic; I'm only going to keep one blog and if something needs to come out, this is where it's going to happen.
Now is the perfect place in my life for this as I'm experiencing my mid-life crisis and discovering that I'm actually only now shedding the cocoon for the first time. I've always cared too much about either what I am (in as much as a label can define me) or what I could/should have been. At some point in my life I either was, or wanted to be, a goth, punk, prep, game-designer, entrepreneur, programmer, MMO end game master, high score leader on game ***, successful, etc, etc. I've NEVER been just me. There's always been a goal, there's always been ambition, even if it wasn't pointed in the right direction. I've definitely turned my life towards a much more positive direction and am starting to experience the rewards of that. Still, there's a definition there that limits what I'm comfortable with or what I feel I can accomplish. There are labels I am rather proud to wear, such as father, husband, employee; but, I tend to let those labels define me more than I should, still, and I'm really trying to let go of expectations and limitations in this. What that all comes down to is really learning how to stop telling myself "no", and sabotaging myself with all those reasons I can't do the things I really feel the need to do. So... I've put school on hold (only temporarily, I do love to learn), am working on putting together a band from scratch (I've been in two in the past, but... those aren't even worth mentioning in an uber-open-honest blog here), am trying to step away from the keyboard more (the irony...), and am proactively trying to spend more time with my daughters, especially when it isn't needed, per se.
I do need to exercise more. Barrier to that is the fact I have class III stress fractures in each leg and anything that involves jumping or repetitive impact (running) produces far more pain than exercise should. And it's dangerous. So I let that be an excuse/fear towards all types of exercise. I'm learning. I need to get a Wii Fit again. Right after I replace the Playstation 3 that died on me today. Blu-Ray > fitness.
Yes, yes... the blog. I don't want to give too much away; after all, this isn't 'just' about purging, I WOULD like some input and dialog with anyone patient enough to read this. If I tell you everything, what is there left for you to ask? That being said, here's what I really have to say...
READING (Book) - Stephen King - "Carrie"
The biggest question is certainly, "What to read?". This question also somewhat helped me leap back over the edge into blogging... surely if it's a question worth asking, it's worth a discussion of some type... and then one tangent leads to another... here we are, several sets of ellipses later.
My favorite author for most of my life has been Stephen King. Oddly, I find myself thinking about liking a favorite author, or band, or television show, and the stigma that surrounds it. I do care; but, not so much because of what other people might think, but because I want to be able to identify with others in a way that sparks conversation - not causes judgement that shuts off dialog. Another way to think of this is that I want to read something I can talk to someone else about, not something that will cause others to turn away. It may not be healthy, but that's the truth of it.
Anyway, Stephen King. Back on track, Jack. The truth is not that I love his writing style (sometimes it makes my eyes bleed), or that I love everything he's written (downright hate some of it). The real reason I love Stephen King is that he has a great, big inside joke, and I want in on it. I would assume that anyone with a real familiarity of King's works will know that he ties most (all?) of his stories together in some way. The brief encounters I've had with the inside joke have always been so, so, so rewarding. When that character that you'd only know if you'd read another book shows up and you can identify it right away... but know that if you hadn't, you'd have no clue... that feeling is strangely awesome. Seriously, check out the following image...
Those are all parts of the inside joke. That 'map' also doesn't include his opus Dark Tower series, which frankly took the inside joke to a level that map doesn't even scratch the surface of. I want to know the joke. I want to know the secret handshake that anyone else who knows the joke will identify with; and no one else will have a clue. I want to understand the world he writes in from the perspective of the membrane that ties it all together. I want the third dimension to his two dimensional pages. I'm gonna read it all.
Well, I'm gonna try anyway. Honestly, I have no delusions of being able to ever stick with it that far... again, sometimes I REALLY hate his writing. But, I'd really, really like to try. So, that means starting at the start; and that means "Carrie". This is actually one of the few books of his I haven't read that he wrote pre-1995. Didn't really like the idea of the movie, so why bother reading it? Well... it's where the joke starts, so that's where I need to start.
As Seger said, "turn the page".
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