2026...

... That sounds like a fake future-year, like something you'd see in an old Star Trek episode. What the hell do you mean i'm turning 27 in 5 months? I graduated a couple years ago. But I didn't. it was nearly 9 years ago, and I haven't been 17 in a long, long time. But sometimes I still feel like that scared kid. I don't think we ever stop feeling like that.

That sounds a bit pesimistic. I'm not, I promise. Maybe just a bit melancholic. In all honesty, I'm weirdly optimistic about the future, despite the uhh... *gestures at everything* I've mentally described it mentally as a "desperate kind of optimism", a kind of 'light at the end of the tunnel', 'the night is darkest before the dawn' kind of optimism. how long can things suck, and everyone is looking at each other saying "hey everything sucks" before they stop sucking? Hell if I know tbh. I'm a rando from the Middle of Nowhere, south Carolina. I hope you're not looking to me for answers, reader.

In all seriousness, in recent times we've seen the meteoric rise of Generative AI, LLMs, Ultra-fast fashion, slop content, predetory social media, and intrusive advertising; yet with all of these we've also seen pushback. And the pushback grows everyday. I personally love watching video essays on YouTube, and I love watching video essays about the listed topics, and in the comments there are always people talking about how the video essayst changinged their mind/educated them on something they were perviously ignorant about. Of course this isn't any quantifiable data, just random comments i've read, but I mean, its something right? Things are't stagnant. People are learning, adjusting, changing.

I've also been facsinated by the Dumb Phone 'trend'. I hesitate to call it a trend because it's more of a lifestyle change, but I can't think of a better term right now. Now this has really piqued my interest. Part of the reason I even got into coding and made a neocitites account was because I wanted to stop using most social media (I still have Tumblr) and cut down on screen time drastically. (which btw, has happened! yippie!!) This, combined with the "going analog" trend (again, not the best term, i think) has helped me kinda rethink the future that was presented to me as a child. You know what I'm talking about? Technology will continue evolving, faster and faster, and it'll be great! All new tech will improve our lives and everyone will buy in and everything will be good! But that's... not really whats been happening. New tech feels so... unneeded, wasteful, antisocial, and harmful; to an extent. I'm no Luddite, but I'm really thinking tech (for personal use ofc- I feel the need to clarify. innovation in medical tech is grrrrr-eat!) kinda peaked in the 2010's. I've been interested in getting a fliphone, modding an ipod or getting an mp3 player, I started carrying around the digital camera I got when I was 13. started carrying around notebooks and shit just so i have something to do other than doomscroll. Everything just feels too clean, polished, professional for everyday people. I wonder if that contributes to the loneliness epidemic facing my generation? Everyone wants to be a character, perfectly written and filmed, not nessecarily a normal everyday person. There's this perfectionist pressure at all times. I'm not any kind of professional, but that's just my opinion.

I have been collecting CDs & DVDs for years, my pysical media collection isn't huge by any stretch of the imagination, but it's been slowly growing. My most recent additions are The Bridge To Terabithia on DVD from Goodwill for like a dollar and I got It's Far From Fucking Over by Appalachian Terror Unit on CD from Profane Exsistence. We cancelled most of our streaming services earlier this year because we were in a tight spot financally (has since passed) and never re-got them, and so I'm hoping to find more movies/shows/music I like physically. Luckily we have a local chain store that specializes in physical media- Books/movies/CDs/records/DVDs/Video games/maybe even casette tapes? But it's a huge store, I feel lucky to have it close-ish (it is nearly an hour away) And of course I have my VHS tapes and VCR from when I was a kid. Grabbed those before my grandma threw them in the trash when i was in high school. (probably a decade ago at this point!)

In more presently-exciting news, my partner and I bought a couch! Our forever couch! When we moved into our house we just grabbed a cheap futon just so we could have something to sit on (we had no furniture at that point) and i mean, the couch sucks. it sucks as a futon too, i've slept on it. Not like, impossible to use but just not good long-term. Maybe I post a pic once it arrives and we get it set up?

Site News

I'm planning on deleting my pages on solarpunk- I just feel like there are people who can explain it better and I don't want my site to become too cluttered too fast, yaknow? I already have ideas for other pages I want to add, and when I started this site I wanted it to be Solarpunk-forward, but now it's leaning more personal. Let's leave the explaining to the experts I say. Still want to make solarpunk stuff, just not have the site dedicated to it.

Planning on creating a Media Page for Books/Music/movie/Shows I like and recomend! As mentioned above- I'm trying to get my screentime down and so I'm being more mindful of what I consume, so I want to consume things that actually inspire me and drive creation. And maybe someone will find something they love after reading those pages too!

Ultimately, when I started this site I didn't have any goals beyond "Maybe i can post about solarpunk stuff", it was truly on a whim one day after watching a video eassay about neocities/personal websites; just threw down a sadgrl site template, customized it, and called it day. Now I have more of an idea of what I want after nearly a year of using neocities and finding so many cool sites: I just kinda want this to be my 'home base' i guess. Shit i find cool, thoughts on stuff, my art and creations. There's this youtube channel i'm obessed with called flowlotl, and she just makes some of the most interesting and creative vlogs i've ever watched- I want a similar vibe here, but in site-form. Does that kinda contradict my lowering screentime goal? Yeah. But like I said, I'm not a luddite.