First!

You have taken your first steps into a larger world...
--Obi-wan Kenobi, Star Wars: A New Hope

Well that is one way to start off this blog, another Star Wars reference on this page!? Actually it is the best place to start, if you look at it from a certain point of view. It's the best place to start because my first successful blog is about Star Wars. After the last film, Revenge of the Sith, was released I realized it was the end of Star Wars in films. I spent more and more time at starwars.com, and decided after reading blogs of others, hey I can do this!

After a month I realized certain truths about blogging: reviews are not easy to write, if you want to argue a point you better know how to argue, and just because you write about Star Wars on starwars.com not everyone is going to read your blog. However, I did expand my interests, and the most important was reading Star Wars novels.

I have read over twenty of the Star Wars books, so far. I was never a very big reader before, but the more I read the better my writing became. The more I read, the more desire I had to write. The blog got better as a result, and I even picked up a few regulars for a while!

I read a lot more than Star Wars novels this past year. As I branched out in reading I felt the desire to branch in writing as well. I planned to start another blog outside Star Wars so I could pursue newer interests. I planned that blog about a year ago.

I am a web developer so of course I wanted the cooliest ever word press installation, with plugins and all that stuff to make my fellow developers jealous. The plan was in motion, well in my head, and probably on a to-do-list I misplaced, which I am sure include plans for a perpetual motion machine. It takes time, and motivation to put together a complete site. These are two things that were in short supply, between my marriage and my career I had many excuses not to set up my blog.

Its easy to say that I lack the time and motivation to set up my blog. However, its not about motivation or time, its about desire. While I desired a blog where I could write about more than just Star Wars, I did not desire it as much as other things in my life. Time and motivation - there is a bullshit excuse. I have not had enough time to do the things I wanted since I was in high school! So what changed all of a sudden, where did I find the desire? Two things changed, one my wife quit her job and two I got sick of myself.

My wife quit without another job lined up over personal issues with her superiors. Sounds simple, but for me its unimaginable. I could never admit to myself that the situation was totally gone. It was easy for me to say 'quit, you do not need this', eventhough I know I could never do what she did. I let my career define me too much, even to the point that I do not hold myself in as high regard because my current job does not challenge me as much as other jobs. I spend too much time dwelling on what I do not achieve and not nearly enough time dwelling on what I do achieve. So in recognition of my wife's brave move I thought, 'what am I waiting for?'

I got sick of myself. Sick of the excuses, sick of the routine my life was becoming, and sick of the bitching. I am hitting the mid thirties and really I do not put myself out there anymore. I have a good job, an amazing wife, and friends I do not deserve. I hit the realization I am not growing into the man I predicted in my early twenties. I am fine with that, I like the man I have become overall. I am just sick of treading water. Without someone to aspire to, or goals to achieve what is left? What is left are the little things, things too small and insignificant to matter while I was trying to get my career of the ground or my love life out of its awkward and too familiar feeling of a bad Rom-com. The little things are drawing, reading, exercise, and all the other hobbies I let fall to the way side.

I am done worrying about my career. I am done worrying about everything I am not doing. For now at least, I am going to listen to the little voice in the back of my head and start making time for new-old-ignored stuff that has built up.

The first on that list is this blog.