I came to the conclusion that I needed a website. Not to promote myself or sell anything. But, just to remind myself that I exist, even if the events of the day don’t seem particularly remarkable.
Lately my mind has been racing. Tomorrow I’m going to make the drive from Sacramento down to Long Beach to be with my loved ones for the Christmas holidays. I’m starting a Master’s program next month and Soba, my cat, needs to get her teeth checked which is apparently extremely expensive (she’s sitting on my lap as I write this).
I get so frustrated picking an identity for myself. In college I was a comedian of sorts, and then after graduating I thought I would be a teacher, which lasted all of slightly more than a year. Now I have a job working for the State of California doing something that I never knew existed, away from my partner, friends, and family. Things have kind of seemed all over the place as I try and find community in Sacramento while maintaining the activities that keep me going.
Hence, the website. I’ve tried making websites before, but they weren’t conducive to blogging like this one is. I figured that since I feel so spread out all the time, I can consolidate everything here, to feel whole again; if I can view it all in one spot, then maybe I can make sense of it.
This is kind of confusing me, so let me try and establish what my aim is here: I am Carl Hatch, and I am a writer who enjoys lots of other things too.
I don’t plan for this website to just be a portfolio. True, I’m going to put everything here (writing, music, drawings, performances), but I think the blog posts are going to be the main focus, because lately I don’t feel like I’ve been thinking about stuff. I go to work and exercise and come back home, maybe go to improv or play guitar, and the whole time I feel like I’m on autopilot.
The website, in a sense, is the project. By adding to it, I’m doing things elsewhere, adding to the portfolio, or trying to make sense of what I’ve read. I miss being an English major and overthinking shit and coming up with ideas about why. Of course, I could do all of these things without the website, but I think it’s nice to have everything in one place.
I plan to post whatever: movie and book reviews, thoughts on the day, thirst traps (if y’all are lucky), stories. I’m going to give the world and everything I do the attention it deserves, and hopefully by writing about it all I can work on my writing, learn about myself some, and inform my other practices.