Sometimes, I get asked by my friends why I have a blog. If you say that you have a blog out loud, it can kind of sound silly. I’ve thought about my usual responses and I have narrowed it down to three – I typically respond with two out of the three.
1) For others: Everyday, I would read the news for hours, but I never had anyone to share it with. I started the blog because I wanted my friends to know what I was actually talking about for once instead of hearing me and then changing the subject because they couldn’t relate. Sometimes the content is stuff you will only find online and not in every day conversations or class.
2) For selfish reasons/myself: I wanted to have a blog so that I could look back on my year and remember the news of 2009. Initially, this was the number one reason. I never intended to share this blog with anyone and it was originally supposed to just be a yearly project.
In all honesty, it allows me the chance to unwind. There is nothing better than making my one concern be that I am behind on news for just a portion of the day. My life – our lives – are so chaotic. I like that I can keep this separate from my life. It’s not some hidden secret, but this isn’t my whole life. This isn’t my career nor would I ever want it to be.
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I had a fantastic heart-to-heart the other night with my friend Bree. I mentioned to her that sometimes in life I feel like I am missing out on key experiences. I watch movies and I get these ideas that I am supposed to follow a standard – that these experiences are supposed to be milestones. Many of my “A Collection Part…” posts resemble images of things I have wanted or want in life. They may be little moments, feelings, emotions, travels, etc. I then said that some of these images pertain to various stages in life – different ages. What am I supposed to do when that age has passed?
I left our talk with that idea still lingering and wondering if we will ever fully be satisfied with not having these experiences – because I like to think that I’m not the only one that feels this way. As I was doing my news reading for that night, I stumbled upon a video called Words directed by Daniel Mercadante and Will Hoffman. The short film is a compilation of life sequences that connect each shot together. There is no normal reaction to watching it. There are always going to be things that I will never experience. It’s inevitable. There are, however, moments in my life that I have lived that no one will ever have. There is no standard when it comes to living your life and movies, society, even short films like this one sometimes give you the impression that your life needs to be this way or else you’re doing something wrong. It’s one of those things like “DUH!” but it is normal to have these types of notions and I don’t find it necessarily naive of me to have believed in such a thing.
What kind of experiences do I mean? These are just four that I randomly picked out near the top of my folder.
– I take things for granted.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0HfwkArpvU]
You should also check out their new video Re: WORDS, which follows the same direction as the video above, but pulled from YouTube clips.