Sunday, May 25, 2008

Awakening

ello all
This is for anyone and everyone who still bothers to read this site. I've had consistently low hits and even lower comments and it resulted in a severe blow to my ego. I had a couple of my biggest confidence hits and lowest points in several years over the past few weeks and if not for a certain safety net, I would have deleted this here blog and stopped writing. Then I started a new blog on www.oleole.com, writing about Arsenal only. It's a massive community and I've been making a few friends commenting on other's blogs and being a general '3-4 comments in a row' nuisance because for some reason they have a 900 character limit.
However, the hits on THAT blog are still low and the comments are a grand total of two.
As if, the thread I was walking on wasn't thin enough, I then spoke to a man I admire immensely and as per his job, we discussed my academic performance.
Categorically, with evidence and clarity he tore down everything I have done for a year and made me realise I have a 'serious problem writing' and 'weak foundations'. Furthermore he pointed out to me how the only assignments I really enjoyed doing got me my lowest marks.

Now, I do not have any memories of writing as a child. It never saved me. I have no diaries and no scrawls hidden away. Writing has never been a 'passion' for me and I only started amid a mixture of badgering and utter boredom. It was cathartic at most. I never had any real 'gift' and my family has never 'always known I'd write something great someday.' I started writing in the 12th grade and I did it because it was easy and my friends would comment and it felt a little nicer expressing than it did thinking.

And yet, perhaps because of some special variant of the 'idiot' gene, I can't see any career for myself but writing. Football blogging, a niche so small and exploitative, its been deemed a digital sweatshop, is something I would love to do. The only real love, or appreciation or buzz I have for writing is rooted in a certain safety net I had mentioned earlier, and a few others I've encountered.
With the safety net, I've seen how the effect of a few written words is sometimes more effective than entire speeches. I've seen a living representation of one of my favorite movie quotes from Rent the musical- 'the need to express to communicate.'
With the others, with Arseblog, and certain apes and certain over analytical self destructive footballers, I have seen a raw, emotive, venting which is in many cases I've found the equivalent of a good cry.
The point is, there is a very raw, very primal expression in writing which has essentially shaped these people I've mentioned's lives. And it is that effect and that passion which I will confess I have introjected first and THEN started to love myself. However, it happened, whenever it happened, and because of whoever it happened, I am hooked.
And so today, with this disjointed rant, I announce, not the turning of a new leaf, but the cleaning and shaping of the same leaf so it looks a little better and hopefully gets a few more hits!
I wanted to start a new blog altogether and who knows, I just might, but for now, I am starting a new approach.
You will read some of the worst blogs you've ever encountered and you will probably never return to this site unless I trick you into it, but I am going to start writing more, and I am going to make myself as good as the people who've inspired me. I will remain raw and true to myself, but I am taking my self pity and cramming it some place dark until I no longer need to worry about it.
Thank you for reading this space, and I appreciate every hit I've gotten, but I've realised, the time has come for a change and so I hope to invoke it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just so you know, I read this because I want to. Not because Im under some moral obligation to read just because you happen to be William and I happen to love pie. I read it because I choose to. And also, cos safety nets are just awesome that way.

Anonymous said...

hi harry,
i walk past ure blog every now and then and i really do enjoy reading it... i dont comment coz i'm lazy.. good luck with the "new leaf" and keep writing.. i don't think "weak foundations" has anything to do with it.. he's just jealous.. lol