ADAB Revisited, Addendum

Claire said to me the other day, when I asked her if I ought to change my blog's color scheme to spice it up, make it snazzy, make it inviting, she said to me, or rather texted to me, this:

"The design matters that much. Just write good shit."

And I am dubmstruck like one of those Japanese Beetles flying into a wall that's been there all along, they just weren't quite sure what they were looking at. Why haven't I thought that same thing before? It seems so obvious to me now, in retrospect, after banging my brain against it midflight.

The answer is, of course, that I have thought the same thing before - just not for myself or my work or, more specifically, this blog. Instead I focused the critical eye on other people's works, dissecting them, challenging them, wondering how they made simple sentences so poetic, or, often, why their words fell flat. But I usually fail to look inward and challenge what I do. I hide it behind clever fonts and dazzling portraits and color schemes.

But now that I have this new whitescape unfolding here, I have come to a crossroads: will my words stand alone, speak for themselves, become the "good shit" Claire so aptly called for? Or will I simply use the newfound simplicity to once again layer over my blog, turning it into a newer version of the same meandering wordage?

I choose good shit because in the end the colors are for a blind man, but the words are for the wise man. Not that a blind man can't be wise; that would be silly. I'm just saying. Words have always been more important to me personally than what holds them up. Now it is my job to make them dazzle against the vast whiteness.