Blogging.
What an interesting past-time this phenomenon became. I say became because at this point, it is what it is. At one point, blogging was the new thing. New blogs were popping up to the tune of thousands a day. The joy of finding a new interesting blog was unparalleled. Pretty much, it had no parallel.
Blogging was as much a social activity as MySpace of Facebook have become. Especially amongst the Black bloggers. We all found one another and formed and maintained actual friendships (in some cases even relationships) and hung out at Blogger Happy Hours and created new never-ever-seen televisions shows like Homiez. Everyday that I got to work, after going through my myriad news-based websites, I’d hit the blog circuit reading nothing short of 30 to 40 blogs a day. Because of this I met some of my closest friends to date. And since we’re all pretty much Black and live in major cities, I’ve had the pleasure of hanging out with all of them numerous times.
And then, blogging got boring. I’ve been reading over my past, sifting through random blog postings made since my debut in 2004 and I’m amazed at how passionate a writer I was. It’s no wonder that back then I was offered a gazillion writing jobs in random places. I was fun and interesting. Hell, I crack up now reading things that I wrote, nevermind that I don’t even remember writing much of it. But at some point, my interests moved away from blogging. Overall, I got tired of reading everybody’s sites. Folks were saying the same shit over and over and boring the living fuck out of me in the process. People that I used to love reading quit blogging or were clearly forcing it.
And there’s nothing worse than forcing it. I’ve done it a few times. You get to the point where you’re filling in space because people are expecting you to write — for free. It becomes a job and anybody who’s employed like us regular people know that jobs suck ass. Sure, you need them to keep the lights on and food in the refrigerator, but largely, if most of us could be anywhere else than at work, we’d be there.
Fuckajob.
On the other side, some people who began blogging around the time I did have become not only internet celebrities but minor actual celebrities in their own right, which is always funny. You see people popping up in major publications and you know them and remember when you both were starting at ground zero. It’s a good feeling actually. For whatever reason, I didn’t want that shine or that wasn’t my goal. Come to find out, I never had any goals blogging. I just felt like writing because it was fun. Obtaining readers galore was icing on the cake and only served to help fuel the fire I had. That and all of the stupid shit that this world creates daily.
But being a good and interesting blogger actually requires a lot of work. You have to constantly come up with something to blog about which is no small task. You have to constantly be abreast of pop culture and unpop culture. Unless of course you’re writing of very personal nature, which I wasn’t. People got to know lots about me but it was thru reading between the lines and keeping a constantly tally card of all the pieces of personal information I’d placed in the atmosphere.
So I wonder, what happened to the passion I had to write? I still enjoy writing and I’m good at it. Sue me, I’m sexxy. Only every now and then do I come across something that really makes me want to speak via blog. I find myself sticking to my lane of race, music, and relationships; things I know best. And that bothers me to some end. What happened to the cat who was creative and witty and could approach anything from any angle. What happened to the different angles I would always find?
What’s changed? Clearly I’m older but sheesh, that shouldn’t make but so much of a difference. I’m the same cat I’ve always been just with much less time (not coincidentally due to this very blog) and yet, when I read the older posts, I see somebody who was hungry, not somebody who’s been eating for a while.
You know something’s wrong when you want the hunger pains.
And yet I do…
