This Is Not the Content Trough
Creating a blog, and therefore continuing to blog, has always felt far away to me. I don't do very many things, and I do even fewer things in which the moment isn't lost in the obligation to tell someone about it later on. To boot, and because I'm told constantly monetization must be an endgame when doing anything in Scarcity America, I do yet even fewer things considered clickable in 2024.
For example
I do not rush from place to place, nor am I starry-eyed by productivity software updates.
I don’t produce vats of carbonated poison to sell at gas stations and drive-thrus 64 ounces at a time.
I don’t drive a toileted van around the country.
I don’t play with my tits if you watch till the end or whatever and I’m not entirely sure what good will come to me if you go ahead and smash that like button.
I’m not addicted to anything I want you to be addicted to as well.
I do not believe mankind’s perpetual state of emergency.
I don’t give advice on how to deceive yourself into happiness or how to better navigate a life you’ve filled with things you don’t want to do.
This is not to say I stand in opposition to any of these. We all have our self-fulfilling illusions to self-fulfill; mine have only been differently constructed for awhile. It's that difference that's left me questioning my place in a world constantly feeding at the content trough that is Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and the portable televisions we now scroll through instead of flip channels through.
I've made several attempts at blogging over the last decade, with each first post leaving me little quick-turnaround material for a second post. I don't like creating as quickly as is necessary to remain in front of people in 2024 and I like even less having to make things I don't want to make in order to keep people from forgetting I was alive on this planet awhile.
But settling more deeply into the blockbusterless nature of my life has felt—and for awhile now—like an interesting space to share myself from. This past winter saw me perfecting my very own soup recipes and man can I dice onions and bell peppers like a samurai. My new neighbor sings Celine Dion songs to his dog. The pothole in my parking lot has gotten so deep it coughs lava. With no appetite left for a social media trough of staged interactions, identity attachment, the only hamstring stretch you need to change your life forever, and the wagging fingers of too-certain truth tellers, life's authenticities feel more interesting to me than ever.
Self portrait. Somewhat mustached and with a distant Groucho glasses resemblance, winter 2024.
As well, putting my glasses on one late winter morning I realized I might look just like a pair of Groucho Glasses were I to grow a mustache. I would be seeing family soon and thought it would be funny to wear a pair of Groucho glasses over my own glasses and new mustache only to remove the Groucho glasses and reveal my face, a perfect resemblance of the Groucho glasses just removed. This seemed also something to laugh at with neighbors, hot dates, and anyone who may eventually stumble across it in a blog post.
Some examples of this material trying to survive on social media
I don't see any of these things performing well for a scroll-mad audience, not even when I headline them in ways that more resemble a scroll-mad language:
I Grew 1,000 Hairs Under My Nose and This Chick Didn’t Even Bang Me
The Mind-Blowing Messages I Receive From My Neighbor’s Dog
#celinelife
5 Dark Truths About Deep Potholes (Number 4 SHOCKED Me)
This Onion Exposes a Fake Samurai (He Cries At the End!!!)
I Made the World’s Largest Normal-Sized Bowl of Minestrone
And it can only be left to the imagination how much better these might do with perfectly Photoshopped thumbnails of me wide-eyed with a giant ladle, red-eyed next to to a pothole, or consoling a sad mustache.
But this blog is not the content trough.
I enjoy creativity, simplicity, and exploration. I spent nearly 20 years as a creative director in film, television, and advertising. I have been walking almost everywhere I go for nearly 25 years. I own a small reiki practice called Inner Spaceship. I will lean on all of these in sharing knowledge, posing ideas, and communicating my daily attempts at an authentic life.
Now go ahead and smash that like button. □
