Keith Handy 1.999

Just like starting over, part 1

We won’t try to cover everything all at once. We’ll probably jump around a bit lot.

What do you know, what do you not know?

I’m keeping the old stuff. I’m not getting rid of it. There’s been this guilt with me for years that somehow my packrat impulse is the culprit that stifles my creative growth in the present. I don’t even know who told me to feel that way, or if I invented the guilt myself. But I’m keeping the old music, the old ideas, etc., because I like them for what they are. I’ve always liked most of the material itself, in some way or another, despite having grown past some aspects of it; if anything, it’s the container or the packaging of the catalog that I’ve never been happy with. And what I don’t know, and have struggled for years to figure out, is: what should that container be?

Idea: wrap every song into its own custom-created Flash file. It can be low on graphics; it can be a single still image or some text with the lyrics or interesting trivia about the song. Make it easy for people to play one at random, instead of having to choose based on unfamiliar titles. The point is, it’s something to experience in an immediate way while online. You can put music online already, but I still buy into the old cliché that people need something to look at, otherwise it’s like you’re asking them to do you a favor by listening. Time is money, chop chop.

What about the blogging thing? Blogging is love-hate. How to keep the love and lose the hate? Look at this post. It has to have a title on it. It’s like I’m “presenting” something to you, so I can’t feel free to just think out loud. This post has to “represent” me. Could I post here about what I did yesterday? Yesterday I found a site where some guy wrote an incredibly long and detailed analysis of the Beatles’ Revolution 9. Since the domain in the guy’s email address is up for sale, and the pages are hosted on Geocities, I thought there might be a good chance this intriguing thing would disappear, so I saved all the pages and carefully arranged them into a PDF file, going page by page to make sure none of his ASCII graphics were split between pages, and fixing a few spelling errors when I saw them.

But if I post about it in a BLOG POST, then it’s like this thing I did is supposed to be representational of WHO I AM. If someone asks, “who is Keith Handy?”, do I want the answer to be, “well, according to this site, he’s the guy who spent several hours compiling some other guy’s Beatles website into a PDF file”?

So what I want is some kind of a feed that’s a cross between Twitter and Blogging, or the full spectrum in-between. Somewhere where I feel like it’s OK to write a one-second comment on the weather, and equally OK to write a ten-paragraph rant about the creative spirit.

I also want to not feel like I have to write a nice “closing” each time I publish, like this sentence I’m struggling to force out right now.

R.I.P. - this blog?

Is it over? Was it over a year ago or more?

Maybe it’s all, like, you know, some kind of “those who can, do, and those who can’t, blog about it” thing. And this blog has failed. And there are actual blogs about… well, there’s a blog actually called FAIL BLOG, and it’s a very successful blog. So it’s not a good example. But this blog is literally a failed blog.

It’s not that I couldn’t have done better, written more consistently, zeroed in on a topic, promoted it, etc… but there are people who are born to blog, and I’m only born to once in a while have a lot to say and need somewhere to say it.

This blog hasn’t really helped me to connect with anyone in any way. So I’m thinking about making it private. I wouldn’t change the settings, I’d still leave it open and accessible and searchable, but just declare that it’s “for me”, and stop even looking at the embarrassing Google Analytics reports. I could even stop allowing comments, but then I’d be tricking myself into thinking people were trying to leave comments, instead of actually getting myself to stop caring.

The rule would be, I’d only post here if I absolutely positively was not hoping or trying to start any kind of a two-way dialogue. If there’s even the tiniest hope in me that someone would maybe respond to something, then it should be posted elsewhere, possibly on one of the “social networking” sites where professional developers actually get paid to ensure that their site functions in a SOCIAL way. It’s not my job to make my own fucking website a “social” thing.

The problem is, I’m not sure there’s anything I ever do say or write that I’m not secretly hoping people won’t acknowledge in some way. I’m not comfortable with “zero comments”. But I have to become comfortable with it. I have to perform to the empty theater, just as I’ve had to draw on blank sheets of paper and put sound on virgin tape. I’ve chosen to walk the artist’s path, for real, and in the act of doing so, I face the abyss. I stop wriggling around and whining, and just say, “hello, abyss”, and listen to the sound of my own voice echoing, and meditate on it. If I have to go through all five fucking stages of mourning, I go through all five, and I don’t stop until I’ve completed them all, and made peace with them all.

Denial: Lots of people will eventually show up, just hang in there.

Anger: You used to follow me and now you don’t; you’ve betrayed me. Fuck you.

Bargaining: What do I need to do to make it more interesting and win your attention back?

Depression: Nobody is interested. Nobody cares.

Acceptance: How can I start over? What would be a more constructive use of this space?

It’s just a blog… it’s just a blog… it’s just a blog… it’s just a blog… it’s just a blog…