Splash No. 200 - Two Hundred

Two Hundred

248 weeks ago, some 19-year-old kid decided to start a newsletter and try writing a weekly newsletter. He didn’t know how long it would last, or what it would be about, or whether or not anyone would read it, but nevertheless, he wrote. Initially, he basically wrote blog posts, short snippets about his life or thoughts or whatever he’d learned or consumed that week. He sent emails on the wrong days sometimes, skipped certain weeks, and then took several months off for a while when everything felt too overwhelming. Sometimes he resented the newsletter when he found himself exhausted at 2 AM on a Wednesday night, wracking his brain to find something even vaguely compelling to talk about. He questioned why he did it constantly. Nevertheless, he wrote. Often with typos and mistakes, he wrote. Often repeating himself and saying nothing new at all, he wrote. And as the world caught up to him, and everyone started writing newsletters, ones that seemed to have a point or a theme and grow popular and lucrative, he still wrote.

After a while, he stopped being the same sort of person, his writing became less expository and more emotive. It became clear that someone had started slipping poems into his ear, or that he started to grow old of just reading self-help books about social psychology. He went from striving towards goals to reaching them, from reaching to enjoying his life, from being overwhelmed to just being. He felt like he found all of the answers at least ten times and forgot them immediately after. He picked up new skills and hobbies and dropped them just as quickly. He had his heart broken by people and by the world and he healed, with people and with the world. And throughout it all, he continued to write. 200 newsletters worth. If each newsletter were 500 words (they’re not) and you multiply that by 200, that’s 100,000 words. And he didn’t write 100,000 words but he got pretty close, and that’s still pretty cool.

But if after all of this time, if you were to ask this formerly 19-year-old kid why he wrote all of those words, he wouldn’t have any single good answer. Maybe he’d try to be really cool and Zen, say something like, “why does the tree reach towards the sun?” (It’s called phototropism, but that doesn’t answer the question). Or he’d speak of his mental health, and how writing regularly helped to keep him sane at some points, even though it sometimes stressed him out in equal measure. Or he’d mention that it was easier to tell the people he loved how he felt when he could wrap it in words, bury his face in his hands, and peek through his fingers as they unwrapped the presents. He’d talk about the moments when he went into the dashboard and looked at the short list of subscribers when he realized that people he hadn’t talked to in years still read what he had to say with regularity, and that seeing that felt like standing in the sunbeams on a perfect day, what the cartoons make heaven look like. That his heart felt like it grew three sizes, Grinch style when he realized he was worth remembering after feeling so forgettable for much of his life. He’d smile and think about the strangers who would reply and talk about how they could relate, and the world would shrink small enough to hold in his embrace. He’d laugh about how much joy he got from a little doodle of him that a reader sent inspired by one of his letters, a perfect exchange of art for some art.

He’s grateful. He’s grateful that he’s had the time and energy to spend so much time writing and that there are people willing to read his words among the billions of words already out there in the world. He’s grateful that he can call himself a Writer™ and not feel like an impostor for saying it. And he’s grateful that he’s going to keep doing it, a letter every Thursday morning. 

Thanks for being here.

Drops of the Week
 

• PLAYLIST - mourning possibilities - playlist for mourning the daydreams that never come true

• ARTICLE - "Just chatting" by some guy named Nikhil Sethi - wrote a longform piece about Twitch livestreaming

• POEM - "Rain" by Raymond Carver - "Would I live my life over again?"

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As usual,
Nikhil