No posts since October 2024 and then four since August 24? One of these posts is a random playlist and another is review of a Conan the Barbarian eBook? What’s going on around here? What’s the point of this blog?
Practice is the point. I love writing, and I never write. I love creation, and I never create. So this is an exercise in commitment.
Not that I have commitment issues. Rather, what I regularly commit to rarely fulfills me. I commit to my job, but if I didn’t have to work it, I wouldn’t work it. Two hours a day on the commute circuit? Two hours a day of poisoning the atmosphere and wearing down my body? No thank you. I commit to cleaning the house. To building habits and routines. To feeling productive. But that’s all a racket. True commitment is creating. It’s loving.
So here I am, in a hotel room outside of Princeton, New Jersey typing these words and learning more about myself than I knew five minutes ago. I need to commit less often to the arbitrary. I need to commit less often to the things others tell me are important: that I should work hard and buy stuff. Instead, I need to commit more to the things I know are important. Travel, love, and create.
I already hate what I’m saying, but—again—practice is the point. When the summer began, I’d been fostering a daily journaling habit. Running every other day. Eating cleanly. Then I broke my jaw, and I let everything fall to shit. I’m being careful with my wording here. The break was an accident, and much of what happened in the aftermath was unavoidable. But much of it wasn’t. A shittier diet was unavoidable. I was wired shut for the first three weeks and wasn’t permitted to chew for the second three weeks. But I could write. I just didn’t. I could create. I just didn’t.
I consumed. I’m good at that. Consuming books. Consuming music. Consuming movies. Consuming video games. Consuming everything. But I don’t think about it. I don’t digest any of it. I don’t put any of it into practice.
But practice is the point. I’m using this blog to think about what I’m consuming. There’s no point in consuming something you can’t absorb. You should get something out of consumption besides temporary escape. Even the trashiest reading material can be a balm to the soul if you let it. It has something to tell you, even if it isn’t something you want to hear.
So here goes nothing. I’ll shoot to add something on Daily Eclectoid every day, but I won’t expect to fully meet that goal. I’ll probably end up writing more if I don’t turn this practice into another checkbox for the day. Some posts will be short—maybe a paragraph. Some will be long. But they’ll all mean something. And that meaning will deepen knowing there isn’t anyone out there reading this. Unless you are out there. In that case, thank you. Here’s some shit I listened to while I typed this out:
• Missed Hits (2025) – Bart and the Brats
• “Epic Day” – Jack Tripper
• “Fool” – Cid Berry
• “Wallflower” – Stone Campus
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