Do Not Read This

Samuel Harrisson here.

Day 6,217

“The coldest weather hitherto. Heavy snow last night, everything snowed up, drifts 4-6’ deep in places, roads more or less impassable, so that there has been no traffic of any kind all day. Violent wind. In spite of all this the tap of the village pump is not frozen, though almost completely buried in snow this morning. Some days back after being thawed out with boiling water it was muffled in sacking, after which it has remained unfrozen.

5 eggs.”

So said George Orwell on January 29th, 1940. Instead of the amount of eggs sold, I will talk of the number of propane tanks I filled.

—

Really? You continued reading? Why? I told you not to read this blog. Oh well, if you must, read on.

I have read many blogs before, and seldom found any good ones. I include writing blogs as well. It seems kind of ironic, right? Writers having shitty blogs? Well it happens. A lot. It happens a lot. This is because writers could only say: “I wrote seven thousand words today… Yeah…” A writer -hell, even a raconteur- is boring in real life. We basically stumble around in our boxers all day, eating cocoa puffs and trying to think of the next great American Novel.

Reader, I am no different.

This is why I am telling you to turn away, to leave this blog and go read a book. And I am not talking about Kindle or any of those E-books. I am talking about stacks of paper with ink in certain caricatures that spell out words. Can you get that lovely, musty smell from an E-book? Can you scribble in the margins? Can you feel the paper as it slides over your fingertips? No. You cannot. So stay primitive, reader. Leave now.

Still with me? Really? Okay. Let me digress further then. I don’t like the idea of blogs or diaries or journals. Why? Well, let’s start with my life. Do I write about my life here? Why do that when I know my life? So you can read it? Let’s be honest, the only people that will read this blog are people that will know me. And these people, well, they’re just doing it out of support. I don’t need their support.

Did we digress far enough yet, reader? I don’t think so. Allow me:

I don’t like my writing. In fact, I abhor it. I know that I am better than the average my age, but I still have much farther to go. Like an ant taking his tenth step into the lawn, and looking to the porch ahead (though ants cannot see), I am nervous. Anxious. Sure, I am ten steps ahead of the other ants, but does that really matter when I have thousands of more steps to take? It’s daunting, really.

Yes, I do not like my writing. I think my prose is shitty and under-developed. My plot is pathetic, and my dialogue sounds as if an introvert wrote it. The stories and poems to follow will not be good, nor decent. Mostly, I will just rant. Either way, if someone does read this, I will tell you to get off of the computer and pick up a book. There are great authors out there to read, why read my diatribes and stories? No matter who you are, whether a professor or pupil, partier or introvert, you have better things to do with your time. I hope that this is the last sentence that you read.

28 propane tanks.