It Begins....

Let me start by warning you not to let that title fool you...While it might suggest that something epic is on the way, I'm sure that for a least the first couple of entries this blog will consist of nothing more than padded promises that the quality of the writing and the relevancy of the content will indeed get better. Hopefully soon I'll get some perspective myself on where this thing might be headed. For now, just try to sit through this painful beginning and perhaps you'll be rewarded sometime in the future for your patience...jesus I'm already assuming that someone, somewhere will chance upon this site and that, against all the odds, they'll take a shine to it, based on their impression of the first couple of lines, which looking back really aren't very good. I'm sure I can count on my friends to act as my loyal readership: Lisa at least will read it, as it was she who finally pushed me over the edge of my boredom into starting this, and as it stands she spends too much time on the internet not to end up reading it.

If you had told me a week ago that right now I'd be sitting here typing away at my brand spanking new blog I'd probably have laughed cruelly in your face and judged you forever for making such an ill-advised and inaccurate forecast of what I might be likely to do at any given time. Stupid person I'd have said. Well if that had been the case it would now be they, not I, who would be laughing cruelly and feasting greedily on sweet success, which in this context I will imagine as a delicious chocolate cake, while I skulk around the edges of the room, nibbling sullenly on my piece of bitter humble pie.
To tell the truth I never thought much of blogs; just the result of thousands of people who all believe they have some nice insight to make on life and who honestly believe that not broadcasting their utterly original and groundbreaking views to the world would be doing a disservice to the human race. What turned my opinion around was the chance encounter last week with the blog of my old piano teacher of 7 years upon which I stumbled while googling a book that she has recently published. I started to read the latest entries, which were all about the book I had been originally researching, and it really caught my interest.
Over the next few days I read back through the last year of her life, more out of interest of what she had been up to since she was no longer my teacher than anything else. After a long time spent reading her blog I found myself viewing blogs in a whole different light. My teacher herself said something very interesting about blogs with which I now completely agree:

"I think that’s one of the ways in which blogging is truly revolutionary – the fact that you can now get a first-hand insight into how certain events and situations affect people’s lives. It’s a job that was previously left up to authors, playwrights and scriptwriters and that usually meant compressing the information into a specific format. Now people can read about almost any issue, no matter how difficult or personal, as it happens and in whatever format or style the author wishes."

I'm not too sure how to work links just yet but once I work it out I will attribute that piece to its rightful claimer. I'm not sure if that will mean anything to anyone reading this, but after having followed my old piano teacher through the ups and downs of the past year of her life I can now safely say that I understand her better than I did even after having known her for 7 years, albeit as a semi-formal student in his teens, and that I would be more understanding of others who have had similar experiences to her were I to meet them. But most important of all, reading it has taught me to respect the blog's ability to share how a person feels to the world in a way that can't be denied or written off, because it's not like spoken words that can be delivered poorly or twisted or forgotten , it's staring at you in a back and white, no matter how many times you press the refresh button.

So....................self-explanatory bit over with. I think I'll leave it at that for my first blog entry (even saying that feels wrong....My old prejudices are obviously not going without a fight). Oh, and because it's my first one: I promise it'll get better soon!.............lol!