I really don’t want this to be a blog. The term itself conjures up many cringeworthy connotations, namely the reek of self-promotion. I don’t go to writing for self-promotion. I write to create a safe haven for the honest and messy thoughts that the real world has little patience for.
Writing fictional pieces lets me simulate alternatives to the real world. But most of the authors I love also traffic in essays, and I can see why. Now that I’ve completed a whole slew of fictional projects, I find myself craving the release of the first person. Fiction is great but roundabout. The themes, motives, arguments, and questions are all distilled through characters. This can be freeing, but so can writing as one’s unadulterated self. If my favorite authors and their books of essays are any indication, I think that both forms can sustain each other. We all need a break now and then from our normal mode of doing things. As for me, I’ve always suspected that I was a seasonal creature. Sometimes I want to act more, sometimes I want to write more, sometimes I want to make music, and other times I want to do nothing. And if I do any one thing for too long, I start to crave all the other forms of expression.
Some months ago, I was asked to do a written interview for ShoutoutLA, an online magazine designed to promote local artists and businesses. The interviews aren’t edited, which was exciting for its freedom, and frustrating when it came to catching typos. The discussion question was “What drew you to a creative career?” I started writing stream of consciousness and found that I had a lot to say. A mini-manifesto on the frustrations of a creative life poured out of me. It was probably a little too much, and it definitely clashed with the tone of the other interviews I read, but I had fun writing it. The magazine’s purpose is to let artists promote themselves. Instead, I kvetched. I am very fond of kvetching, but that’s the subject of a different essay.
I’ve been trying my whole life to find a safe place to think how I think, feel how I feel, and live how I want to live. That’s why I came to Los Angeles. Los Angeles is a city of dreamers exploring alternatives to what has long been considered a “normal life” in the United States. Living in a city of dreamers can be both exciting and off-putting at the same time. Los Angeles exists at that section of the Venn diagram between counterculture and consumerism. There’s no shortage of advice out here, and a lot of the advice has an implied common theme: in order to succeed and self-actualize, you need to spend more money. But, I digress. The subject of Los Angeles will also have to be its own essay.
I don’t want to give advice. That’s not why I go to writing either. I go to writing to get a break from advice, to let my thoughts roam without an agenda. Of course, ulterior motives sneak in. Even as I write this, I fantasize about an essay going viral. I am not so pure myself. I fantasize quite a bit, and a lot of those fantasies are pretty grandiose.
On Medium, the posts with the most views seem to be well researched and specific. That or they have a specific slant about a certain experience (the most recent example I saw was about how much someone got paid for their YouTube views). That’s not what I’m here for. I just want a space to ramble and explore. I already have multiple projects that I shoot out across the world, hoping to harpoon some career prospect. On this page, I just want to see what happens when I let a little bit of my brain to leak out.
It’s hard to separate things based on motive. At the end of the day, I try to make stuff I genuinely like. That’s where I try to draw the line, at least when it comes to what I put out with my name on it. I wanted to write essays for the same reason that I write anything: I kept hearing them in my head.