A little history: I started my first ‘blog’ in 2006. The intent was hardly to write much of anything at all – I was teaching myself a little web-design and needed some reason to keep at it. I had written a few short-stories and whatnot at the time so I threw them online. Writing as a hobby hadn’t fully taken hold and I had no particular aspirations to get anything of that sort published legitimately.
As writing became a growing passion, the relationship inverted. Web-design became a means of keeping my pen to the paper – the first iteration of Servusamanu was updated daily and it was a disaster. The pace was too rapid for me to put even the slightest thought or effort into what I put down. I still come to that problem even updating weekly, but at least I can manage more than a single paragraph before calling it a day,
Of late, a new set of problems and half-fixes have arisen.
The most difficult is the matter of compartmentalization. I have a job working for a New York State library system filled with low-stakes politics, an ever-frustrating lack of resources, occasional technical amusement, and all the petty terrors of everyday employment. After hours, I am an MBA student. My classes are the usual mix of engaging and soporific, but the occasional pseudo-poignant idea comes to mind. With whatever time remains, I’m co-owner of a web-design and IT solutions company that’s slowly growing from childhood to precocious adolescence. Without strutting and fretting upon the stage with placards of customers and their woes, I’m left with ideas and future plans. Lastly, I write. I don’t get to write as much as I should like or want, but I do manage and I should very much like for that to define what I do.
The resulting question is simple; what should I write about?
With this particular edition of Servusamanu I’ve tried to cling as closely to writing as possible. The difficulty is simply that anything I write here, I cannot publish and anything that I wouldn’t want to publish, I would be embarrassed to upload here. This week I finished a short-story. It needs editing, but I think it’s a solid science fiction story. As mentioned previously, it’s my attempt at affecting the atmosphere of Lovecraft within the confines of known theoretical physics. For lack of a better description it is Shadows of the Grand Design, which is starting to sound like a damn good name actually. As much as I’ve love to hack apart my annotated notes and toss them online, it would render this week’s effort largely for not – I’d never be able to publish it anywhere else.
Thusly, the subject of writing is my own fertile desert – a breadbasket of inedible life.
I would love to write about work, but I suspect I would quickly cease to work soon thereafter. In coming weeks, there is some expectation that my position will take a slightly longer view of the industry. I should very much hope that this more strategic approach will afford me some amount of personal influence over libraries and their valiant struggle for relevancy, but that remains to be seen.
Creekside Systems is an even worse source of material – I am secularly blessed with a very congenial band of clients and my ideas for the future constitute the sole well of trade secrets I have access. Besides, there is nothing massively enthralling about the day to day operations of a prepubescent startup. When Creekside labor steals away the last time I have to write – I’ll surely have a wellspring of enthrallment to offer.
Similarly, I have nothing to say about a trio of evening MBA classes shifting semester by semester.
And so what remains to me? The news, fantasy football, occasional curious internet finds, and myself. I used to comment rather frequently on the news – in retrospect it comes off rather puerile these days. Again, should I ever have a hand on policy it is then I will have entitlement to spew it out without regard.
My fantasy football team is debauched. The Seahawks are even worse. This year is a waste of my time.
I happen to have two rather exceptional internet finds this week:
HeroRats: this organization trains rats to find land mines, detect tuberculosis, and re-enect scenes from the Rats of NIMH. I kind of want to adopt a rat…
Vice Guide to Liberia: I like documentaries – this is one of the more daring I’ve seen. Liberia is an exceptional mess – and it’s going to be getting a lot worse soon…
The last subject to source is myself – that is, me bantering about me. Now how would I go about that…
Adieu for this week!
