Go Fourth

Over the past year, I have posted in this blog exactly four times.

Four times in a year, for a blog I once posted in almost daily and which had a readership that astonished me on a regular basis.

Today, I had reason to go searching for an old blog post I had written, and tumbled down a rabbit hole of reading post after post from 8 years ago when I was younger and bolder and maybe (a lot) more naive.

How times have changed! Back in 2013 readers would spend a solid chunk of time reading words, while now even I find myself addicted to the short, sharp bursts of serotonin TikTok provides, all emotion and no need for thought.

I stopped writing for a very long time, at least writing anything of substance other than what was needed for work, and virtually nothing of a personal nature.

Why? Perhaps in the intervening years I drew inwards, more reluctant to be vulnerable as I began to understand how cruel the world can be to those who are vulnerable. Perhaps I lost faith that people would read my words, and perhaps I lost faith in my ability to write words worth reading. Perhaps I just got busy; or perhaps my focus slid elsewhere as it does when our life begins to fill with other things.

Recently though I felt the pull again, perhaps not to write the same kind of paragraphs long posts that I once did, but short "bursts" of thought, microblogs inspired by whatever caught my eye or my mind long enough to be remarked on.

And so, here I am. Will I blog more than four times next year? Will I even write again this year? Will anyone read it? Who knows, really. And does any of that matter, either?

No. In the end, I will write when the inspiration hits me, when I feel the words clambering to be released, when it feels good to tap my fingers on the keyboard. I will keep it short and simple and tight and true to the spirit of this blog, which was to always be honest, even if I wasn't always right.

It is time to go forth, and maybe this time around achieve more than four in a year.