"Newness Is No Virtue."
From an early age I'd always had a strong interest in books. As I developed into a young teen, I was drawn heavily into Tolkien's Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and H.P. Lovecraft's body of work. Lovecraft was harder to get into; I struggled with The Case of Charles Dexter Ward on several occasions before finally making my way through to the end. After this, I quickly sought out all of his other short stories and remain a huge fan - not just of the eldritch terrors Lovecraft wrote of, but also of the verbose literary style that saturated the tales that were barely "good enough" to be published in the sci-fi and horror pulp magazines of the day. Both Tolkien and Lovecraft created worlds that, while incredibly intricate and fraught with otherworldly perils, seemed immensely less complicated and mind-numbingly inane as this unfortunate time period in which I've been forced to dwell.
Maybe it's a "grass is greener" mentality, but the present is hardly an exciting time to live in. In fact, the older I become I grow less concerned with anything happening currently in the world. This leaves the future and the past as points of interest for myself while I struggle to cope with being stranded in this, the shittiest of all eras in human history. Part of the issue I have with the modern world is the complete and total lack of any sort of freedom we have. We are oppressed by our consumerist glut for shiny new things. We are divided by our feelings of superiority against those who possess differing opinions on any subject, be it religious, political, sexuality, racial, nationality, etc. We are worn down by a world filled with the distractions of instant gratification.
Suffice it to say that I hold very few tethers to any of the several billions of fellow humans that I walk among. I just find most people too uninteresting to try, if that makes any sense. Our predisposition for pretentiousness is something that I've worked hard at breaking free from. No matter who you, there is always an alteration in your personality that takes place when you begin to interact with another person, and while others might not notice or even admit to it, this has always been something glaringly obvious to myself. The company I am sharing has always been an altering factor towards the reactions and rejoinders that my internal processes select, whereas an alternative response would have been chosen for someone else. It seems insincere to me, but it is something akin to a natural instinctive reaction to being subserviently approved of. And by fighting this urge, I feel I make others uncomfortable. Conversation does not come easy to me as it is. Writing is a far more eloquent form of communication, and I try my hardest to make logical sense while having something genuinely interesting to say. But my own personal criticisms have held me back from ever doing anything in a more creative capacity that might have commercial appeal to any sort of audience.
That's partly one reason for starting this blog. It's my first, and I'm hoping that putting my thoughts and ideas out there will convince me that getting it out is more important than getting it right. In the future I hope to have some bodies of work that I can use as a portfolio towards getting some more interesting and artistic work, and maybe one day I'll be fortunate enough to remove myself from the rat race that keeps me from having the time to be truly creative.
I apologize for the randomness of my thoughts, but little else.
"I was so surprised to find that after all it doesn't hurt to be alone"
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