As a twentysomething, I am occasionally involved in conversations with other twentysomethings about having children and starting families. And inevitably, there’s one person in the conversation who says something like, “I’m not going to have children. I just don’t know how anyone can bring another life into this fucked-up world.”
There is, of course, only one reasonable response to this, and that is: what a massive tool. But I’ve been thinking a lot recently about starting a blog, and I found myself recycling many of the said tool’s arguments. Blogging today is not the world it once was. There are political blogs, sci-fi blogs, and sex blogs. There are blogs written by old people. There are blogs written by young people. There is even a potted plant who, after a fashion, blogs.
Most of it is crap. 99%, at least. But some of what is not crap is actually pretty good. And some of what is pretty good is actually breathtakingly good.
It is, then, a rather intimidating world to become involved in. With so many voices, how will mine be heard? Will anyone care what I have to say? Indeed, do I have enough to say to make such a thing worthwhile?
In the end, I decided to go with it, for myself as much as for the reading public. (I do love all of you, though! Please keep coming back.) What appealed to me about it, I realized, was that it was a space. A space for me to share my ideas and opinions with the world. (I have, you see, many more opinions than I do people to listen to me go on about them.) A space for me to share funny YouTube videos. And above all, a space where I can use however many goddamn semicolons as I please, and be secure in the knowledge that nobody else can edit them out.
What can you expect from this blog? I’ll probably write most regularly about politics, especially about Barack Obama. A bit about foreign affairs, especially about Cuba. Quite a bit about music, I would expect. And probably also incidental posts about: science fiction, the 49ers, technology, and New York City. Also other things. What can I say? I’m unpredictable.
Thanks for tuning in. And please: if you like what you read, leave a comment! If you don’t like what you read – leave a comment! I would really appreciate any kind of feedback; it will reassure me that these posts are not simply disappearing into the void but are actually being read by someone, somewhere. Unless you are a blogger yourself (not a bad guess, really), you can’t have any idea how much this means, but let me tell you: it means a lot.
Keep ‘em coming!