October 1st, 2022
It’s October! Did you miss me?!
Back at the beginning of September, I decided to take the month off of writing.
I needed to reset. Blow in the cartridge of my brain. I needed a break, an adjustment, and to think about what it is that I do and why I do it.
Some months I was writing an essay almost daily. That’s like a songwriter writing a song a day or a woodworker creating a birdhouse every 24 hours; they’re not all going to be good, but some will be great, a handful transcendent, and the artist learns something with each one.
Plugging my nose and submerging myself in the murky waters of philosophy has actually given me a revelation.
“Montaigne’s works were not always consistent, which he would probably have regarded as a virtue. He was engaged in a sort of dialogue with himself, which continued throughout his life.”
This quote is a distillation of both philosophy as a whole and what I’ve been doing over here all these years.
Sure, you and I have a dialogue. On our best days, we teach each other, we learn from one another, and we grow.
Most of the time, though, comment sections are wastelands, and I can’t claim mine an exception.
And so the only way I’ve been able to carry on is by recognizing this public dialogue with myself. I’ve turned this into a place where I can make a true statement, and then contradict myself and try to make that true, too.
This is how I edge the sword.
I attack and criticize the same words I share to see which ones hold up and why. This is important because other people attack and criticize my words, too, and in order for my ideas to survive, they have to be strong.
And I think that’s really why I needed the break; neither I nor the words had the strength.
But I am back like the Sanderson sisters and oh boy do we have a lot to talk about. Welcome to spooky season, everyone.
The Den 