This is a Story

This is a review of an article from 1981, but it also isn’t. It’s a story about a kid being a magazine in a Walden books, but is also isn’t. It’s a story about stories and storytelling, but it also isn’t. Most importantly, it is a story about me, but it also isn’t.

Long ago, around 2012, two events occurred, without which I probably wouldn’t be writing this review today. The first was the shutting down of The Forge, a place near and dear to my heart, of which I was an active participant in. One day I might spend some time, now that time and age have given me perspective, writing about its importance, influence, and challenges is presented me, but not today. For today, it is just important to note that with its shuttering I had lost a key creative outlet.

The second event that occurred is that I discovered Google+. To this day, there is truly nothing like it on the internet. It had the near permanence of forums coupled with self moderation mechanisms and a broader findability (not a word, but totally a word) of social media. It seems appropriate that after Google killed blogs by destroying RSS that they create what amounted to a microblogging platform (which they then did kill, which was another dagger in the heart of the open internet).

As I said, those two events opened a door for me to start writing reviews of old Dragon Magazines as microblogs. It was fun, filled with screenshots, and cheeky comments. I think I scratch a nostalgia itch for myself and my friends and got the most engagement out of anything I had ever posted to the internet (don’t you people like art?).

Which leads me to now. I have a nostalgia for the early days of the internet, where massive organizations didn’t control all the things you see. I pine for the days when blogs were this delightful archive of the weird that could be found without a blue checkmark retweet or a paid influencer posting.

Time for me to start posting anew. Time for me to write long form musings centered on the Voyages of the Princess Ark that meander into the related and unrelated thoughts that the articles trigger in my brain. Time get these thoughts out of my head on the regular once again.

But do I have time? Is there time enough? Is there energy enough?

I know I can’t reclaim the magic of the early internet. We are past that moment. I know that Facebook, Google, and all the rest have permanently destroyed the promise of the open internet. It doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.

My grandma always told me, “Keith. We are Kennedy Democrats!” It’s a loaded phrase filled with family history I might go into one day, but leads me to my favorite quote, which I will leave you with.

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things (accomplishments and aspirations), not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.”
~ John F Kennedy

So maybe it is time I try to do the hard thing?