June 19, 2007

As all things must,

 this has a beginning. As to whether all things, and specifically this thing, must have an end, I will not concern myself at the current moment, but merely with moving forward, whether to a definite end or an indefinite continuation.

     This is the Gray Beyond. First, some thoughts on what this thing is not, and perhaps what is is.

• It is not a "community". No guestbook, no forums, nothing like that. Maybe I know you and talk with you elsewhere (see you there), maybe I know you and don't talk with you (go away), and maybe I don't know you- in which case this is not how we are going to start talking. This is an anti-social non-network that is purely something I do for my own amusement- as well as for that of those who fall into that first category (IE: my friends). Otherwise, it's like an obelisk in the Egyptian desert, or a Poe manuscript, or a sandcastle you found while walking on the beach- the creator was here, but whoever he or she was, they are not here now, and are only going to be back on their own schedule, if at all.
  
  
• It is not fundamentally about design. If I can evoke the mood in, and impart the content to, those to whom I wish to speak, I don't care if others think the design is lacking. I'm new to this, if that's not obvious, and I have a novice's arrogance that I am going to strive never to lose. Think on this: Beowulf and Gilgamesh are still with us. If it were about design and not content, would that be the case? I will never hide a lack of something to say within layers of pretty design. I've read the newspaper/listened to the radio/ scanned the web on slow news days, and I'm tired of sound and fury signifying nothing. I've read Dashiell Hammett from a yellowing paperback in an atrocious font- and it still kept me reading. If I use tables for layout- not that I am right now- and that matters more to you than that I am not saying anything interesting... I think you are a fool, and not in the good tarot-card sense either, buddy.
  
  
• It is not a blog. No, its creator will not do things the easy way. The Gray Beyond is a document, and its creator does things the cowboy way, hewing pages out of solid rock, grinding them to fine sand, and forcing them up the phone line over the 300-baud connection a grain at a time.
  
  
• In proportion to what I have to say at the moment, it is already too long. And so, for now, it stops here.
  
  

     -its creator