I haven’t felt like blogging much lately. Not because of writer’s block. It’s more end-of-the-day exhaustion. I write all day at work and the last thing I want to do once I’m off is switch over to my personal computer and write some more. My eyes can’t take it. They need rest.
I’ve tried here and there, but when I asked my brain to be thoughtful or creative or cunning after 5 PM, it’s all like, “Nah. How about some TV?”
And I have succumbed.
What makes this post different? Punk rock. Punk rock, say what? That’s the energy I want back in my writing. The old school mentality that’s still deep in my soul. Think Black Flag. Bad Brains. Loading all their s–t into a van, venturing off to a club, plugging in, and leaving it all out there in short, fast bursts.
They weren’t trying to impress anyone. It’s just what came out when they plugged in. Writing, punk, whatever. It doesn’t need to be perfect. It’s about doing the damn thing. Wabi sabi. Imperfections. Flaws. All.
Somehow, blogging picked up rules it was never meant to have:
- Be insightful
- Have a strong opinion
- Be polished
- Make it worth every reader’s time
- Say something important, epic
F that. That pressure is a great way to stop writing entirely. And it’s worked on me the last few months.
Punk rock had a better idea: three chords (you don’t even have to play very well), no permission. Just do it attitude more than a decade before Nike made it a corporate slogan.
I guess this is my small manifesto to myself then. Maybe to other writers and bloggers out there. Who knows? You don’t need to wait until you have something brilliant to say. No need to smooth every edge of every thought or sentence or paragraph.
Just show up and get it out of your system. Some of what I say may only matter to me. That’s fine. Black Flag didn’t cancel a tour gig because every show wasn’t transcendent. Hell, they didn’t even have a singer for many of their early years because they cycled through singers like a bag of potato chips. They’d just snag people out of the audience to hop up on the mic for the night.
They played because not playing wasn’t an option.
Anyway, I guess that’s where I’m at right now. This post isn’t a comeback. Enter LL Cool J. It’s not a statement. I don’t know. Maybe it is. But it’s honest. It exists in the wild. And it’s done. And right now, that feels like the most punk rock thing I can do.
Also, we currently have the flu in our house. Fun times.
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