every story has a beginning

On a side-note, had I embraced that little whim of fate, and you would probably be reading this instead:

"Once upon a time, in a land deprived of heroes and where magic had all but died out, there was a boy that was not small with a problem that was not simple: he had a thing about starting his stories..."

Ultimately, I'd end up in the same place, no matter what road I took!

One of the things I hope to see in my own writings, is the trail of those little pieces that make me... Me.
Every time I finish writing something, when I slide back through the words to re-read what I have just produced, what I have just conjured out of my mind, I seek (and expect to find) myself in-between the lines, in-between the words, hidden in the white-spaces, and even softly whispering back through the void the ellipsis¹ conveys.

Now, I am not saying that the fairy-tale approach would be without merit. You could weave as much (or even more) of sparkling creativity in it as you could with any other kind of approach... but it would just seem too easy - and lets face it, it's a bit of an overused phrase - making its value, at least in my eyes, close to nothing. And that is definitely not the way I'd like to start this (or anything else, at that).


What bugs me most about "beginnings" in general (and in this particular case of starting my blog), is that the first impression, that first picture of something, be it in a thousand words - in a book, or post, or mail -, or in a simple tenuous smile - when you meet someone whose own simple tenuous smile makes you feel brilliantly alive - can effectively make or break all that follows suit.

It's one of those kind of moments that define, where you subject yourself, in the form of your persona or that of your work, to the judgement of others. A judgement that is, most of the times, hasty and without a solid understanding of the circumstances, serving only to, for the lack of a better way to put it, tag others.

... and I say others because, as we all know, self (which, naturally, is not part of the others set), is an excellent judge of character (and everything else), and as such, its resulting opinions are "most obviously accurate"! Even when self doesn't know shit about what it is talking about.
(yes, I also believe I'm an excellent judge of character ;))

There's really not much of a safe-ground in this. So it's best to tread carefully.

In that first contact, you can either build a terrible image which makes other people's minds snort "yuck!", thereby sealing a not-so-noble fate, where you just get tagged with a nasty label that means you are, almost certainly forever, well... screwed².
Or, on the other hand, you can raise expectations far too much, transmitting a self-made image of something you are not, and which you cannot, no matter how much you try, keep up indefinitely (and even if you can, you'll most probably do so at the expense of feeling miserable). The only certain outcome is eventual disappointment (and possibly rupture).

Truth be told, it is possible to start a journey in turbulent waters and still somehow find a way to safe grounds. Possible, yes, but not probable, as people, in general (yes, I include my self in that lot!... yay!), are kind of lousy at giving others second chances (even though they will naturally expect them back, whenever it's their turn to screw up - only to then be confronted in shock with the "complete unfairness" of not being given one).
But still, what annoys me the most in all of this, is that people fail to provide those second opportunities to those others they know deserve them (most of times because they just let pride get the best of it), and then as if to compensate for that seemingly apparent inability to (for)give, they seem blindly compelled to grant endless chances to those they very well know they should not.


Oh well, people³!...


Alas, I was digressing!
What I think I was trying to say is, I was eager to start this the right way. I wanted to make an interesting and captivating post (the lot of you that fell asleep halfway should really be ashamed of yourselves! - but, hum... if you did find it boring I suppose you won't even reach this part anyway... damn... oh well...), something that had a little bit of me in it, and all without running the risk of having it end up severely over-worked.

And now that I look at it, I think I might have just successfully done that! I'm happy! :D

I think a little celebration music is in order:

from the ending credits of Half-Life 2: Portal by Valve,
'Still Alive' by Jonathan Coulton: http://www.jonathancoulton.com

"This was a triumph.
I'm making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS.
It's hard to overstate my satisfaction.
(...)"

(find it on YouTube - it's quite catchy, really!)

—

¹ Which really does seem to be something of a trademark in my writing - even though I'm trying to avoid them right now, as I find I usually do abuse the poor things far too much - well you can say that I am on a ellipsis-controlled-mode now... really!... (I'm not sure how much more I can keep at it, though!)

² I was actually thinking of using fucked, as I am quite the fan of expletives, but I thought that one shit was quite enough for a first post

³ Here I was considering using the term humans instead. Then I realized that would kind of blow the cover up and really make me look like an alien... and I wasn't sure you earthlings were ready for that yet! So people will serve its purpose for now - and perhaps be served, one day...