It’s about a year since I fully embraced blog writing. I was waiting to start a Gap Year and intended to travel. My friends were about to leave for university. I needed a distraction and I wanted to concentrate on doing something I loved. Hence the growth of this blog.
I didn’t manage to travel. I still intend to and desperately want to. Perhaps I’ll take another Gap Year a few years down the line or have a truly adventurous and globetrotting summer. There are so many places I’m yet to see, from European capitals to America and Tokyo. I’ll get there one day. That’s what everyone says I know but hopefully I mean what I say. If I won the EuroMillions I’d go tomorrow. But I might need to start entering first.
Travel writing would certainly be a new challenge and the idea excites me. Capturing the personalities of people in the crowds, as well as the places themselves, is an appealing task. It requires great skills which I would have to develop. Even if my academic brain has been neglected, I do feel as though I have learnt some things, acquired some skills, over the past twelve months.
I’m not sure how I stumbled into reviewing so regularly. I suppose I followed the old saying about taking opportunities that present themselves to you. Reviewing films, sometimes TV or books, is certainly not all I want to do. I want to create my own stories and sketches, perhaps scripts or plays. I haven’t focused enough on that desire.
If I take a glass half full view though, I have immersed myself in storytelling. Hopefully this has taught me more about it, as I absorb the bad, the mediocre and exemplary films that I review. Some of this may well rub off beneficially when I do come back to seriously contemplating my own writing. And of course I have written a sketch that will be performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in a few weeks. I could never have imagined such a satisfying and exciting end to my year of writing development.
The Fringe sketch is a good example of how much I have achieved.
But it’s probably just human nature that I dwell more often on the negatives. I
have not read enough, of either new fiction or classics I should’ve read, in
philosophy, history or literature. I feel that I have not improved enough as a
writer. I have learned that there are deadlines to meet, even with the room of
freelance work, but too often I make do with something I know isn’t my best
work. I still finish pieces knowing I could have done so much better. I do not
have enough of a personal stamp or brand either.
This probably accounts for the poor viewing figures of Mrt’sblog. Despite the increasing success of sites like Flickering Myth, which I write for, my personal blog continues to remain unseen by most. There was a period when figures rocketed but then they sunk rapidly back to depressing levels. I have over a hundred Twitter followers these days and Twitter certainly has its networking benefits. But it has not had an impact on my blog stats. I can’t help being frustrated by this.
I remain torn between serious articles and funny articles, pieces about film and pieces about literature, opinions on football and opinions on politics. I have struggled to link my interests and to continue all of them separately, resulting probably in average output in terms of quality and frequency in every department. I have, as I’ve mentioned, enjoyed some success writing elsewhere though.
On political issues I have written some of my highest quality pieces, in my view, for Demo Critic. On film I have settled into contributing regularly for Flickering Myth, helping the site’s strong grow in a small way. Football pieces I have written have done tremendously well for Caught Offside and brought in the most traffic to this site. And this week I have started writing for Blog Critics (all of these sites are linked in my Blog Roll).
I couldn’t have imagined doing that well a year ago. But now I want to do better, just as time is running out. I will not be able to write as regularly as I finally head off myself to university. I know I have to get some serious reading done, simply to get back in the groove of devouring books and to exercise intelligent muscles, before the end of September. I will not stop blogging but it may at times have to take a backseat. I certainly won’t stop writing for Flickering Myth but again, it might be less frequent.
Despite my niggling regrets this saddens me. Writing can be incredibly lonely and daunting and disheartening. It often goes without praise or reward, unlike when you do well at school or on a pitch. But I enjoy it more than anything. Watching films and sharing my thoughts on them would be an amazing way to make a living, or even just a fantastic sideline. I’ve experienced the reality of writing and I still love it. I might have failed to achieve certain things on this year out but I have a vague plan for the future. Write, write, write. Move to London, eventually get a satisfying and interesting job. But keep writing. Write articles and all sorts of other stuff. Combine the lot.
This post is not a goodbye but simply a heads up. It will also serve as a reminder to myself. If you do read regularly I thank you wholeheartedly, it means a great deal. Things will wind down here as I head off to read, study and be a student menace to society ( yup don’t worry I will have fun too). But Mrt’sblog isn’t going anywhere and it will still archive everything I write elsewhere.
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