Hello World!

“My name is Sam, and I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing starting a blog. I mean, I used to blog ages ago but I haven’t in a really long time, and back then it wasn’t nearly as… social as it is now. WordPress was so insular then, with every man (and woman too) for himself, there just wasn’t an atmosphere of community. Of course that was also before Facebook got huge, before anyone could tweet, and before Google became God (but I don’t bow down to it)…”

That’s probably how I would have started my very first blog entry for Sam’s Online Journal if I were following the outline set forth by so many people before me and since. But you know me — I had to be different. In fact, I think my very first blog entry was the start to my series about Target — Keeping it Brand. I told myself that this blog wasn’t going to be similar to the last one because it was going to be on my own terms, and it was going to be daily. I had let my previous blog peter out because I was writing it for others, and I was disappointed by the lack of correspondence it generated. So I said screw it with this one, and to fit with the theme, I just wrote about what was on my mind, my re-introduction to the Target society, as it dovetailed neatly with my reintroduction to the blogging world.

The daily thing was crazy too. I mean, since I can remember I have had lofty aspirations for my regular journals. At first it was that I would write in my journal daily, but that became too much responsibility. Plus, I just didn’t have a lot to say some days, and I would let it sit. So I revised my expectations, saying I would write once a week. Once that fell by the wayside, it became every month, then every other month, until I had gone two entire years without writing in a single journal even once. And it showed. See, I am the type of person who needs to write. It’s how I get out my emotions, my feelings, my thoughts, and synthesize them, so without the outlet I had begun to shrivel away, a la the wicked witch of the West.

I needed this. I needed something to tie me down and tell me I had to write every day, that I had to get my thoughts out. That’s why it’s online. Not because I was dying for affirmation of my thoughts and feelings, but because I am online every single day. It was a convenience and a reminder built in from the start. I hardly ever do physical writing anymore, even though I still have physical journals and I do once in a while still write in them, but online, that fits. Besides, I realized that WordPress had a really cool app too, and my Droid (oh yeah) was able to utilize it quite well. That enabled me to write into my blog anytime I wanted, anytime a thought hit, which was dynamic, and just what I needed.

And I have done what I set out to do. In fact, my blog continues to morph and change as I do, as my emotions and feelings change and shift. A friend of mine has a blog called Shift, because the only thing constant is change, and she’s so right. Writing down my shifting views, and my shifting world, has proven to be right up my alley. I don’t think I’m the most interesting person in the world, or the best writer, but I do think that I have begun to appreciate myself more since I started this blog, and I’m glad I didn’t write a “Hello World” post back then because it wouldn’t have even begun to capture the essence of me like this blog truly has throughout the eight months of its existence.

Thanks for assisting in my therapy. Hello World!

Sam