Things That Make You Go “Hum!”

My good buddy from work, Jason, is an evil man. He recently posted a blog about hitting his 100th post and the discussions he had with a couple of friends about blogging. And be it his blog or our totally tangential conversations, he gets me to think. And at times, it can be painful because he will bring something I had not thought about and I stop and go “hum!” He has shut me down a few times with his counter-arguments.

In his current post, he mentions that one of his friends believes blogging is self-indulgent and a waste of time. And yes, there are many blogs that are just pieces of mental masturbation that should be relegated to a litter of paper and then burnt.

But I do see where he is coming from. Before Jason, I had no real interest in blogging. I would read blogs where people would just repeat the mindless actions of their days and bitch about how horrible life is. It was just a bunch of people caterwauling who did not have a life and should.
But after going through Jason’s blog, I saw a powerful format to express oneself. So I jumped in, both feet, straight into the deep end.

As Jason mentioned, and it is the same for me, he is not interested in the number of hits he may get. What I want is to make people stop and go “hum!”. It doesn’t have to be deep like my on-going series on the homeless. It could be a recommendation of a good film I saw that someone did not consider checking out.

As in any media, we are awash of tons of channels of shit. You have to sort through it and find the blogs that have something to say.

What I am finding I like is the ability to speak my mind, let all those out there decide if my words have any merit. And if they stop and think about something I have said, or investigate a link or an idea, then I am ecstatic. I’ve done my job.

I am an artist. My media is writing. From early on, I was not writing to change the world. I had no interest in persuading people to the way I think. I do not want people who revere me and hang on my every word. I want to spark dialogue, debate.

Be it issues like gay politics, many of my straight friends have gotten valuable insights from my rants. They get to see more than just what is presented in the media. But at the same time, I have made some enemies.

I will give you an example of dialogue. My friend Brian is a conservation Christian who believes homosexuality is a sin. But we can discuss it. We can agree to disagree. This is not a pissing contest. I have my point of view and he has his. And each of us, within our own paradigm, are right. I do not ask him to compromise his beliefs as he does not ask me to do the same thing.
Now where Jason and I will disagree (Monday could be interesting), is I do see blogging as self-indulgent. An artist is self-indulgent. They do not live in isolation. They want people to read their words or look at their paintings and get a reaction.

And bluntly, artists have big egos. That is why they have such a drive to get their stuff out. When someone reacts, there is reaction, validation. I know when someone has commented about my fledgling blog, be it positive or negative, a faint thrill goes through me. It is the same when I get reviews on my short stories or my massive series Tangled Threads from people who I have entrusted to read what I have created.

Yet this is not a bad thing. A true artist has a voice that needs to be heard. He or she is pointing to something that they had identified as important. And we should listen.
I can hear some people going “tut-tut”. This is blogging. But there are a lot of people out there that have a voice that need to be heard. And unlike magazines, papers, etc., here is an avenue that lets one have free expression without the constraint of an editor.

So for Jason’s friend who thinks blogging is a waste of time, I believe he is wrong. Over the short time I have been blogging, I have been able to express things I have wanted to. My two-part rant on suicide helped me through that couple of days. My writing on being homeless has allowed me to see what amazing steps I have accomplished over the past couple of years that I was not seeing.

Journalling has helped me focus but it is personal and no one normally reads that. But when I put out my thoughts out onto the web, it is now out in the open. Open for debate and derision. It can be an exhilarating thing, well for me that is. It almost like therapy.

And the final thing, before I sign off and try to get back to my stuff on the homeless, what I love about all of this is I can go off on tangents. My mind is awash with thoughts and ideas. Sometimes, too many. But to sit down, here in my room, usually with a bottle of Sleemans, I have some time where I can completely focus on one idea. Which still goes all over the page because of my constantly shifting thoughts.

Yeah, blogging is self-indulgent. Many of them out there are just wasted electrons out on the ether. But I hope people like Jason and myself make up for that, giving posts where at the end you stop and go ‘hum!’ If I do that occasionally, I am happy. I do not expect more.