Today, I spent time thinking about why I started blogging. What magical thing went off in my brain and said “hey, you’ve got things to say, maybe people will read them! or maybe not, but you’ve got things to say, and you should say them anyway!”
The first blog I started was this formalized thing on blogspot my mother coerced me into. It was a thinly veiled attempt to explore my passion for English. Every post I put up was something I had crafted over a week of ideating, discussing with one of my parents, and then typing it out. Each post had a picture that it was uploaded with – the co-ordination I ended up doing was mindblowing to me at the time. There was a sense of pride with having your own URL. At that time, I was never into creative writing, so I ended up penning posts like “My Visit to Burj Khalifa”, which hahahah, come to think of it, even had this one line that said “AHHH IT WAS SO TALL”.
Looking back, I don’t think much has changed about why I write, or the style I write in. Much like Salman Khan treats his twitter, I treat you, my blog readers (if any) as people – and imagine that I’m narrating something incredibly boring to you all.
What got me writing the second time around was that I really wanted to have a voice at Law School. And the fact that I thought I was humourous – so I’d end up blogging these funny things that went viral and was the subject of memes. I actually ended up blogging from the library about night mess food a bunch of times, because I found it thoroughly fascinating.
Writing for me, however, has evolved now. It’s my only no-filter place. I often type things out on WhatsApp to people and backspace messages because I’m not entirely sure how they’ll respond to things. With this blog though, there’s no double-thinking. I type stuff out. If people respond, they will respond.
I’ll deal with it citing “editorial discretion” or some mumbo-jumbo of the sort I end up concocting.
Writing over the past year has ended up being cathartic. I can write about mundane things like my day, or take prompts and write things based on those. I can write things about friends without using their names, pen sentimental pieces of appreciation.
And then read them and reconnect the dots.
That’s what I love about where I am with my writing. I’m learning to relive things while enjoying what the present has for me.
And I’m trying hard not to overanalyze or overthink.
Tejas Rao 