A place to write.
February 23, 2008
Filed under:Real
There comes a time in every writer’s life that they realise they need to be writing, most times just for the sake of it. It doesn’t have to be anything remotely resembling profound either, it just needs to be written. It feels like it has to come out. While this may be true at the time, it is also a common event to revisit something that was written during these moments and find that it is absolute shit.
Doesn’t matter. It just needed out. I’ve read great words and thoughts from great writers, and I’ve seen and heard interviews where they’ve imparted small bits of wisdom, passed on some of their techniques and advice on how to use what can be considered talent. The best and most consistent advice that I’ve ever heard was the simplest as well.
Write. Just write.
I get that a lot, that urge to write. While it’s usually an urge to actually create something, writing satisfies it in a way that few other things can. Drawings have a way of never feeling completed and tend to take too long for my taste. Building or making something is nice, but strangely dissatisfactory when I’ve finished, and cleaning is, well, cleaning. A productive use of my time that does nothing for my soul.
The day I realised that I was a writer was when I felt that I’d done something to make my soul feel better. It’s cathartic, to say the least.
Something that a writer needs, other than the urge to write, is somewhere to write. A place that they can not only sit and let their thoughts create a story, or at least a pattern, but somewhere to put it when they’re done.
I haven’t had a place like that for a while. Sure I’ve got my little corner of the house, a hidey-hole where I can sort of shut out the World. Saving stuff down as Word documents in a folder called “writing” isn’t working for me anymore. There are lots of things that aren’t working for me anymore.
I’ve built this blog into something that I suppose I had intended it to be originally, yet no longer have a use for. It was fun to write things that made me laugh, that made me feel, that made me think that others out there should share in this. The feedback I received was overwhelming to the point of life-changing.
I’d gone out looking for something, I suppose, and I found it in spades. Suddenly my sense of purpose with this… writing place, was less clear. It’s an understatement to say that I’d lost my focus, and this finally made sense when I applied some hindsight and saw what it was that I was doing with my writing, with my blogging. I’d found what I was looking for and, once I found it, didn’t know what to do after that.
I’ve purposely kept my real life quite separate from this blog, and have had to find ways to help build my ever-expanding online presence without using this site and it’s juice, so to speak. There’s only so much that you can hide though, from the online world, and only so much that paranoia can protect you from. There comes a time that you realise that they’re not actually all coming to get you, and you don’t really have to worry about how much they know about you.
Like my old man used to sometimes say, “If you’ve been good, then you’ve got nothing to worry about.” Don’t know if I’ve necessarily been good, but for whatever I have been I make no real apologies, for whoever it is that I am today has been built upon that, and I reckon I’m pretty pleased with who I am today.
So, as the finely sliced division between my original online persona and my actual online self starts to fade away, I realise that I’m going to let it. I’m not going to purposely bring the two crashing together, or even push the issue, I’m just not going to be as fervent at keeping them separate and distinct. Part of that means putting some parts of me out there that I normally wouldn’t share with this audience that I’ve built over the years.
Part of that means accepting that people are, just like me, multi-faceted, and don’t necessarily have to have things the same as they’ve always been just because they’ve always been that way.
My name is Judd, and I’m a writer. I’m 33 and married to an amazing woman that read this site one day and started an unbelievable string of events. She had two kids before meeting me, they’re mine now, though the law and some crappy people disagree. We’ve made a kid of our own, and her level of awesomeness is higher at 12 months than most people ever get to in their whole lives.
About a year ago, I quit my job. I quit my job for no real reason other than I was sick of working for someone else. I was tired of putting up with great quantities of shit just so somebody else could benefit from my energy and efforts. I started my own business doing web consulting and web marketing and am writing as much as I can in my spare time under the misguided notion that I’ll someday have enough material for a book that more than 12 people will want not only want to read but pay to do so.
I’ve been needing a place to put the stuff that I’ve been writing, meant for a book or not, and I’m going to put it here.
I hope you like it.
16 Comments
Shitburgers, looks like I’m going to have to do some fkn design on this bastard too. Ain’t I?
I’ll get right on that, just after I make a sandwich and maybe shat.
So welcome back (Kotter?). And as a long-time fan and possible consumer of your webliness services, you might consider posting a pointer to your business presence. I suspect a few of us might well become pretty good clients.
Sweet! Can’t wait to read regular Judd writings again. All the best to you and yours!
Amy :)
Hey!! Good for you. Can’t wait to see how this all comes together. Design? Ought to be interesting….:)
I’ve made a pact with my writer friends that if ever they write a book, I’ll purchase it — and I have. The only stipulation is that I can hang over your head like a persistent mosquito and make you purchase mine, too, if ever that day comes. Once a fan, always a fan.
Not of mosquitoes…
But of whatever you have to say.
Dang! I have been feeling the same, I think. It’s been 2 long years for me, and just created a new blog tonight! come on by if you want, can’t promise my crap will be anywhere close to as good as Your’s Judd, but I’ll try.
I think you have a unique ability to express things that make people “feel” while at the same time you let them laugh. I think that ability is what will make you successful.
I’d say “About time”, but who am I to say anything to anyone?
Go for it
This might sound a bit strange but I’ve been a lurking reader of your’s for AGES. I read you when you were still on Diaryland & before you even made your journey down to Australia. And during all that time, I don’t think I’ve ever actually posted a comment on any of the blog posts that you’ve put up for the world to see. I’m not sure why I’m finally doing so now but it seems as good a time as any. Shame I don’t really have much to say (although you wouldn’t think it by reading this massively long post, would you?). Just wanted to say good luck & like most everyone else’s thoughts on the matter, “about time”. :)
Crap,
I was going to write on this topic on one of my next entries, but you did it better than me again.
I know there are a lot of writers out there, but I take the concept of writing very seriously and very, very personally.
It is a very long topic that you and I could probably discuss for hours.
But what I love about you is that I don’t have to.
I think of you as the intellectual “kick in the groin” writer friend that reminds me that writing doesn’t have to be important or funny or mind-altering.
It just has to be.
– Plops.
Holy-Epistolarian Batman! That shit was dope.
I know that this was just the prologue, but it was brave, bold and showed a great deal of maturity (read: major cajones) to recognize who you are and what you are going to do about it. I wish you much success with your intentions and look forward to what is next to come.
Mad props my man, mad props.
Alright,
Juddhole is going to become my new bible! I swear, I was sitting at the keyboard earlier on the 27th, trying to figure out the few blogs I was missing, and now, when I read again, bang! There’s the post from one of the my favorites, Plops. This is like, a holy miracle machine, man… BTW, I just had to read it again, it’s that good.
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