Happy Anniversary to Me!

Whodathunkit?

It was one year ago today that I wrote my first Dispatch. Amazing how time flies, isn't it? Even here, in the Suburbs of Hell, where one day seems to blend into another, time does pass before you know it. Makes you want to stop for a moment and take it all in.

Which, I've found, is dangerous. Because when I get introspective...things start blowing up.

The past year has been perhaps the most eventful I've ever had, personally and professionally. Over the course of these last twelve months I have seen one era of my life come to an end and another begin, rather belatedly. I saw the passing of family members, from this mortal coil and from my life. I wrestled with semi-serious illness, and demons both internal and external. I even came dangerously close to self-destructing, and it was only through the support of loved ones and the Grace of God that I'm here now. In short, it's been a rough year, full of ups and downs, right and wrong choices, trials and tribulations, and a whole mess of other cliches.

But now things seem to have finally stabilized. Professionally, I'm on solid footing again, having found a decent job that I like very much, and that I just might be able to hold onto for a couple of years. Personally, the Flame of My Heart and I have spent nearly two comfortable years together. And creatively, I'm starting to feel the juices flowing again. My creativity has been stifled for a while, for whatever reason. Stress, worry, what have you. But I'm starting to feel the urge to get back to writing. Maybe to finally finish that second novel that's been glaring at me from its corner for all this time.

I like to think this blog has helped me. I'm not sure if blogging and/or reviewing counts as writing or not, but it's certainly helped me keep my creativity muscles from completely atrophying. And of course, it acts as a safety valve. You keep things bottled up inside, sooner or later you're going to explode. So having a place to set down what's bugging me that week is a good thing for my sanity. May not be good for the rest of you, but that's neither here nor there. Sometimes I wonder how blogs will be regarded in the Annals of HIstory. Will some historian a thousand years hence compile my ramblings into a volume, to be studied by scholars the way I studied Cicero or John Locke? Will the name "Anarquistador" take its place among other great nom-de-plumes like Voltaire or Juvenal? Am I simply arrogant to assume that I'm providing valuable social commentary? Or am I thinking too much, once again?

Well, all a man can do is live his life and accept the judgement of history when it comes. The past is past; can't be helped. What remains now is to look ahead. What will the next twelve months bring? What personal trials await me? What brilliant obeservations will I make? Who will I piss off with them? I have no answer. But after this year, I think it can only get better.

Hope is an unfamiliar thing for me to have. But I think I have it. Ever Forward, then.