bg/ag publishing

bg/ish: ...

I don't want to write this.

That's part of the problem. I have something to say and I'm not sure how to say it. There is something I'm feeling and I'm not exactly sure what it is. But here's the gist...

I keep thinking about quitting.

It's the thought that's been prevailing in my head for the last few days now. Every time I work on this blog. Every time I struggle to put together ideas for a column. Every time I post something inane. I'm struggling with my own lack of direction.

This has nothing to do with any new project. It has nothing to do with the "feelin' in my stomach" I posted about the other day. This isn't fueled by depression or disappointment or anger or spite...

I love bg/ag publishing. Goddamn, goddamn I do.

When Nam and I started doing this so many years ago, it was a collaborative project that was built around showcasing things we'd worked on together. We wrote a couple books, Recognition Day, which led to Ghetto Shaolin, and then what might have been our finest work, The Homieship Chronicles. The original bg/ag publishing was built around these projects, which we both worked on. It was our words, our art (well, ag's art), and bg/ag publishing was the canvas it all exploded onto.

It's hard to explain, but I don't think there ever could have NOT been a bg/ag publishing. The stuff we were doing... it had to come out somehow. It absolutely needed a forum. We were driven. Motivated. Very proud.

It's interesting to think back. On our first site, we wouldn't curse. That's how bg/ish or ag/ish came about in the first place. "Ish" was just our way of saying "shit". bg/ish was just my way of saying, "OK, this is my shit". We had other columns and stories we'd run back then. There was BOTW, Movies So Bad... and others. But as our collaborative works slowed and eventually stopped, the "Ish" columns became more frequent and personal. I swear this was all before the word "blog" even existed.

We lost that site, and for several years, did nothing at all.

Then, in July of 2008 came the revival, a "rebirth of sorts". I absolutely, in no way, regret this at all. In fact, in some ways, but for different reasons, I'd say that it pretty much had to happen as well.

I'd stopped writing. Nam had too as far as I could tell. I'd toyed around with the idea of a blog, but had no idea as to what I wanted to do or how to even get any consistency out of one. Bringing bg/ag publishing into the blogosphere was in every way the right thing to do, and in many ways, it's been more of a success than I could have ever hoped for.

We sit here today with over 250 posts, and readership possibly numbering in the double digits. Haha. That's good shit! And yet, in spite of all this, I'm sitting here feeling as if it may be time to walk away. Close the doors. One final orgy with the interns, and leave without cleaning up.

But fuck, I'm torn. I don't know. Even as I wrote that last paragraph I'm thinking, "No more intern jokes? Fuck!" I mean, shit, I could build an entire bg/ish around a good intern joke and some verbal pimp slapping of ag. So what's my problem?

Seriously, what the fuck is my problem?!?

Well, the more I think about it, the more it seems to be an identity crisis. As few as the differences may be, I don't write this blog as myself, I write it as bg, aka blagguy. Like I said, it's not far from who I am, but there is still a barrier there, between that persona and who I am. And although bg/ag publishing doesn't stick to a specific format or subject matter, there's still this strange set of guidelines laid out in my head as to what constitutes Pub material and what doesn't. This may or may not make any sense at all.

It's also true that the collaborative aspect is completely gone. I'm not bitter about this. It's just the way things go sometimes. ag is busy doing his thing, I've moved away, we just don't hang out anymore. No more tangentialism, no more 10 minute jokes, no more Bi-Mon Sci-Fi Con. Again, these are all things relegated to our amazing past, and there is no reason to be the least bit disappointed about it.

Revamping the Pub as a blog kept us in touch, kept some aspects of our homieship in tact, and I'm sure on more than one occasion made us laugh, and reminisce about the days of old.

But it goes back to identity. What is the identity of the Pub these days? I'm not sure. It's probably safe to say that I contribute about 85% of the content. Your boy ag has a pretty full plate and does what he wants to here and there. Again, I'm not judging or pointing fingers or anything of that sort. I've never pressured him to contribute anything, because that's not our style. Our friendship comes before any of this, and will continue long after it. This isn't about that.

We asked chair to contribute some months back, and she too, has done what she can. Personally, I've loved every one of her posts for us, but she's got a life and other things going on and certainly not the same deep emotional attachment to this little love child of your boy ag and myself.

So, maybe there just can't be a bg without the ag. And maybe there can't be a bg/ag without the tangentialism, the 10 minute jokes, the Bi-Mons, the beers at the Goat and all that. I honestly don't know. I'm a very confused man.

I have to say, I've been dwelling on this for a couple of days now. lz, what you shared here, besides being fucking amazing, really inspired me to start sorting this out with words on this page.

ag and chair, seeing you both this last weekend was the step just prior to that. I really do love and care about you both immensely, and I know that if anybody will understand what I'm saying here, it's you.

Ok... so...

All of that being said, I can't bring myself to say, "I quit." At least not yet. But I can say, my heart is not 100% in this right now and it may be time for a break or some time off. For fuck's sake I feel like Brett Farve...

So, leave me a comment if you have any input or feedback on all this. Even if all you're thinking is, "Dude, 3 people read your fucking blog, shut the fuck up with your crying and shit", well, fell free to say that too. Maybe my perceptions are all screwed up. Maybe it's all an averse reaction to the Indian food I had for lunch. I dunno.

Perhaps next week I'll feel like, "Fuck all that nonsense I spit last week, lez do this." Perhaps not.

I know for a fact that I could certainly keep doing this. What I'm not sure of is if I can't. If you know me, you know that I'm loyal to to the people and things that I love. I love my boys ag and chair, and I love this blog.

Otherwise, I just don't know...