Wherein the author reveals his true nature to be that of an egomaniacal hermit who created this overfed pseudo-biographical tabloid as an incubator for his various delusions of personal celebrity. But first, France on a cool summer day. Just over two months ago I was sitting on the TGV from Bordeaux to Rennes, staring out the window; my eyes tracking hedges as they ticked by with a pleasant regularity. The day was bright and clear, and as we accelerated to cruising speed, the little French villages became momentary blurs; summery palettes of stone gray and grass green smeared across my window. After a few happy minutes of thinking about absolutely nothing, it was time to begin. I rummaged around in my backpack and pulled out the little pad of lined paper I’d purchased earlier in the trip. It was about half full of urgently scribbled fragments; only a few were legible and none were worth the ink. No matter. I found a fresh page, clicked open my pen and began to carefully outline the new design of this website. It has been redesigned eight times over the past two years, and each time - as I find whole days being sucked in to serious, brow furrowing considerations like whether a border should be ten pixels wide or five - I feel that little prick of doubt in the back of my skull, which upon closer inspection appears to be a total lack of purpose behind the whole damn thing. Purpose has never stopped me before, (in fact it is something I gave up on quite a while ago) but at a certain point at least a cursory inspection of why is in order, as I would hate to find that the project which has occupied the majority of my time over the past eighteen months is just an enormous waste of coffee.

First, some context

The notion of blogging as a medium for compulsive self promotion is sort of the norm these days, right? The term itself has evolved in to ‘social networking’ over the years, but that doesn’t change the fact that you still heave gigabytes of yourself up on the internet for friends/family/total strangers to admire every day of the week. (And if you don’t, you’re friends do it for you.) Big players like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter coddle this need to be seen by packaging their services up in to templates and limiting the expected input from a user to almost nothing (which oddly encourages exactly the opposite behavior), but these are cosmetic changes; the underlying expectation; that people will find your life worth watching, is still the same. Now, I’m not saying that it’s healthy - I’ll leave my various crabby geezer opinions about facebook and the horrible panic I feel after checking my ‘news feed’ for the tenth time in a day or thoughts on watching the word ‘friend’ be torn down to something essentially meaningless and trite for another post - just that the act of putting yourself online is so streamlined at this point that having a website of your own seems like overkill, as there are already hundreds of communities that will happily broadcast you around the world for free.

In the dark

These communities put actual website owners in a category all our own. We become the weirdos muttering to ourselves far from the comforting glow of any known social hubs, which makes contact of any sort something of an accomplishment. Facebookers may wish they had friends who they actually knew, but lets face it, those of us with regular ol’ websites will take anyone who happens to swing by. If it’s popularity I’m after, I’d be better advised to find it through the traditional channels. So if it isn’t popularity, then the perhaps the driving force is some raw need to just be noticed. Maybe we’re the kids that went off and played by ourselves at recess as a way of garnering attention and sympathy at the same time. Jeffery Zeldman (one of the design community’s most famous bloggers / web-standards evangelists) wrote a short article recently, gloomily suggesting as much. “The dirty little secret to success”, he concludes, is “a longing for love and approval” that comes from “a brokenness in you that continually craves attention and affection you somehow missed out on”. (It should be pointed out here that Zeldman was in the middle of a rather public divorce, but he’s absolutely right.) A “brokenness” of sorts. I guess that sort of hits the nail on the head. But if the best we can come up with as ‘a purpose’ is creating a place that caters to my needs as an attention-seeking sociopath, I’d rather look elsewhere. So sue me.

not all bad

Alright, I think we’ve covered most of the sinful/damaging things. How about the good ones? The obvious upshot to having your own space is getting to use it as a venue for absolutely anything. Like ill-advised art projects or dismal Valentines Day poems or photos of your feet. In my case, the whole undertaking has an oddly centering effect in my life, which comes - in a large part - from having created the site myself. I carry around a camera for XXVI, a sketchbook for restless, and write thoughts worth pursuing in a little pre-post moleskine. Publication, even self publication, creates a catalyst for creative production. Production is practice, and practice is necessary if all of the things you’re interested in pursuing professionally lie outside the scope of your educational background. And maybe that’s all I need.

which is all to say

I doubt I’ll ever be a professional photographer, writer or artist, but having a little nook to try on various hats and practice a trade without any ‘real world requirements’ (ie, an education tailored to any one of those three or producing content that has to pass a review process) is an incredibly valuable thing, and despite the drawbacks, I think it might be worth keeping around for a little while longer.

Comments

Carla
I really like your soapbox man by the way. Beautiful drawing. Looooooove it.

Carla
I was actually looking at my 517 friends on FB yesterday. Would I hug ALL of those people if I saw them? I know at least 5 are creepy stalker types that I only accepted because I already denied them at least once, and was slightly afraid. At least 10 few are the "popular kids" from high school who I would have nothing to say to, because even in high school I was not quite one of them. I have a large number of "McHattie's" living in England, mostly London. Who send me messages and family invites, but I have really never met. But I think I would hug at least 400 of these people. And that makes me feel really good. Should it not? This seemingly large number of friends a record of where I have been and the things I have done along the way. After all Nate, you know I have a knack for being all over the place in every possible way. You used your amazing, self taught, web design skills to build me a place to share my passion of Pots with the world. You share your passion too, of exploration, of so many things. With us. Your eager readers. I would liketo point out that I was also, quite knowingly, a "kid that went off and played by [myself]" seeking attention and sympathy at the same time. And now we know that strange kids grow up to be strange, but sometimes interesting adults. I think you are thinking too hard. A creative outlet is a beautiful thing. Yours just happens to inspire me all the time. While also making me feel closer to a friend that is almost always too many miles away for a great big hug.

Father
"Friend" what a meaningless, shifty, unreliable word! How shallow and cynical the concept! When I think of the years I've spent sharing my world with facebook "friends", it just makes me want to pour myself another stiff drink and lament the time I should have been spending with my children: do any of my friends really rejoice with me about those yummy strawberry blintzes we had for dessert last night at the Munseys? Do they care about yesterday's posting that I am completely torn with indecision about buying the new Arctic Monkey's album or spending the money on groceries. (Hey, c'mon guys: I want a little serious debate here: Music or Food? Enough already with the joky comments.) "Parent" on the other hand--how nice the sound! unrelenting, durable, inescapable! It's reassuring to know you can't delete or unsubscribe us: you push the button and we're still standing here. Plus, we have opinions about everything you do; why don't you ever ask us? Five pixels: it looks more elegant. The photos of your feet: okay, I guess--your mother says they looked out of focus. Facebook news update: right you are--- a total waste of time! (We're not afraid to sound like crabby geezers. Shit, we ARE crabby geezers.) Would it surprise you to find that your blogs are probably being monitored by Homeland Security? (Okay, along with every other American citizen, but still.) Or that lots of people just blow through, read the stuff and don't pause to sign the guestbook? Michael Dorn recently discovered that his blog has a reader who lives in Iceland. The guy now sends him garbled but apparently well-intentioned replies. (could be something to do with Mike's small vocabulary and simplified sentence structure that makes Icelanders enjoy his stories.) And who knows what those kids who work in the World of Warcraft mills in Taiwan read while they're on break? Anyway, keep up your work. You are not just another lonely attention-seeking sociopath crying out in the wilderness: you are an attention-seeking sociopath with a fussy, judgmental audience. (Using brown for the links: blue wasn't good enough? How about some more photos of life on the Campo? And while we're at it: Where's are link to Saltcooker? ylf

mari
"I doubt I’ll ever be a professional photographer, writer or artist"...whatever, if you think so...i don't. But, in any case, you didn't mention the word ..MUSICIAN! ha! saltcooker rulez!