Possumblog

Serves 'em right, indeed.

"Well, it's finally gotten easy enough, so I herewith launch out into the fetid, overcrowded harbor of blogginess, courtesy of some computerized thingamabobber. You know, when they tapped out the old "what hath God wrought" line on the telegraph, I'm sure they figured this is where it would lead. Serves 'em right."

And thus five years ago this very day was launched the grand and exciting experiment we like to call Possumblog. Hard to believe, actually. I mean, who in their right mind would sit here and type 60 months' worth of twaddle as a lark!?

Well, me.

It's been a very interesting run. Like so many other folks, I trace my desire to use this medium (thus called because it is neither rare, nor well done) to some sort of need to make some sense of the world after September 11. Blogs had been around for a while, although I never knew that there were such folks as Glenn Reynolds or Steven den Beste, but when I found them it was certainly a pleasant discovery. They, and folks like them, didn't sound like maudlin teenagers or angry conspiracy nuts, and the discourse sounded nothing like the Usenet flamers and bulletin board trolls I was accustomed to ignoring.

So, after a few months of inspiration, this little treehouse was hammered together with some scrap lumber and bent nails, and a "NO IDIUTS ALOWED" sign was posted on the tree trunk.

Although I suppose it would be nice to have had the sort of skyrocketing popularity (i.e., money) of the folks who grew up to be the A-listers (some of whom really aren't very good, which I suppose could cause a pang of jealousy in that I'm equally not very good), I never really have tried to do that. This is my own little place, and sometimes I get some attention, and most of the time I don't, but either way, it doesn't kill my ego.

Why?

Well, this pile of poop has allowed me to vent, rant, ponder, pontificate, commiserate, and most of all, give folks all over the world just the slightest hint that just because I'm an openly-straight, Bible-toting, gun-owning, pasty-white, slow-talking Southern man, I might possibly just not quite fit the stereotype people have come to have of such folks. I do wear shoes most of the time, I do have a vague idea about such things as philosphy and thermodynamics, I have read more than two books (including one that didn't even have any pictures in it!), and believe it or not, I don't think people who disagree with me should be shut up in a reeducation camp. (I'm all for sending them to live in France.)

Anyway, I have generally written what I want to write, about the subjects that interest me, and you all have been a remarkably patient lot of friends I can count on to come by and sit for a while in the chair over there by the door. For that, you have my eternal gratitude. Really. I often think that I would have gone insane the last few years if I had not had a way to put some order to my thoughts and been able to interact with someone out there in the wider world--someone who doesn't see a conspiracy behind every tree. Or Bush. So being able to sit here and imagine that I'm having a friendly, somewhat loopy conversation with a friend who happened to drop by my office has been a true blessing.

Thanks.

Now then, where do we go from here?

Suggestions gratefully accepted in the comments below.

Posted by Terry Oglesby at December 20, 2006 09:10 AM