Hello internet, I’m back.

I find it hard to believe I haven’t posted since 2017. To be honest, I have never been what one would call a regular blogger. Sporadic is the phrase that comes to mind. If you’ll forgive the self indulgence, I’d like to say a few words in my defense and lay out my future plans for this space.

I started this blog way back in 2012. Prior to that I was active on LiveJournal when it was the “hot new thing” – post MySpace but before Facebook. More specifically I was active in a particular LiveJournal subculture. From around 2000 till I believe 2013 I was an active member of the Ordo Templi Orientis. (I was also involved in some smaller related organizations, but those were mostly adjuncts to my main “occulture” investment). LiveJournal was, for a while, very popular in among that group of people, and we would discuss, fight, argue, joke around. In the larger world, no one gave a shit about us, but we had our own celebrities, scandals, power plays, politicians, jokers, entertainers, intellectuals and fans. I was attached to what could be called a reformist movement. We saw ourselves as fighting for the future of our group and by extension civilization as a whole. We had a dangerous “bad boy” reputation, and we loved that. We felt important, and would chat for hours both on and offline about our struggles and in group drama.

Things eventually went sideways. The details will have to wait for some future time but I’ll give you the short version: I was “all in” for a long time… and then I wasn’t. This divorce was messy and ugly and took years to play out in full. I lost friends, but far more challenging than that, I lost a core piece of my identity; not because I was that attached to being a member of any particular group, but because my confidence in the underlying paradigm behind these organizations could no longer be sustained. Call it a crisis of faith if you will. Around the same time-period, and not entirely unrelated, I went through an actual divorce. It was a rough period.

I eventually found my feet again, with a renewed interest in philosophy, new friends (and closer relationships with the friends that stuck with me) and eventually a new marriage, a new career, and a more recently a family. With all the change going on in my life a commitment to blogging just couldn’t be sustained. I tried to channel the fruits of my reading and thinking through this space, but that was haphazard at best. I even considered deleting it, closing up shop, and moving on.

The initial impetus to create this blog was muddy. I was trying to find my feet again philosophically, but I also wanted to make something that other people would find interesting. I missed the heady days of LiveJournal and I wanted some of that feeling back. In the back of my mind, I also was cognizant of the growing market for a new intellectual movement. I wanted to be part of the conversation. I also missed having a creative outlet. All of those are good honest reasons to write, but when you’re working full time, starting a family, and trying to hit the books in the little free time you have, a muddy conglomeration of interests just isn’t a luxury for which you have the time.

So why am I back now? The most honest answer is that I can’t stay away. True, I have a little more time now – maybe an extra hour or two a day, but that doesn’t explain why I’m using that time to write a blog that very few people read. I’m doing it because I have to speak my truth, and this is as good a place as any. For some reason, preparing a piece that I know is going to be put “out there” forces me to put my thoughts together in a way that writing in a personal journal does not. Even if no one else reads this, it’s useful for me, but useful doesn’t tell the whole story.

When I was around thirteen I decided I wanted to be a writer. I would dabble in it from time to time and then do something more pressing. I told myself that “one day” I would come back to it, but there was always a reason I couldn’t do it “right now”. After twenty plus years I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to write, for me. Even if no one else reads what I write, even if I still have to struggle to fit it in between my day job and my family and friends and exercise and all the other demands of life, I need it. When I don’t write I feel like I’m not being true to myself; like something is missing or I’ve forgotten something important that I just can’t quite remember. When I’m not writing, I feel like I’m shirking my duty to myself. I guess after half a lifetime of wondering if this was something I really wanted to do, I’ve discovered it’s something I have to do – whether I “really want to” or not.

For now, I’m going to keep my plans loose. Fate permitting, I’ll be working on a blog post every day Monday through Friday. I can’t promise I’ll be able to publish every day. It will depend on the nature of the post and, as always, the vicissitudes of life. I’m mostly writing this post today to clear my mind and prime the writing pump. We’ll see what happens.

Best wishes,

– B