I
know, I know. As opening paragraphs to blog postings go, even on a site
like this where the quality threshold is already staggeringly low, it's
far from brilliant; if it had the use of a telescope mediocre would
still be a dot on a distant horizon in front of it. The fact it's there
instead of something else though (and trust me, there was an awful lot
of awful something elses there before it) may give you an idea of how
difficult this thing has been to write.
You
probably won't believe me but when I wrote the statement at the end of
last year saying new stuff was on its way to the blog my intentions were utterly
sincere.
2013 is/was the
10th anniversary of Mossley80 existing in one form or another on the
internet and while I normally hate the marking of the passing of time
(birthdays, New Year, etc.) I wanted to do something for the website.
Why? Even though I'm not much of a sentimentalist I do like the site
and hate that circumstances have left it to wither and die in the way it
has over the past couple of years or so.
My
aim was to try and correct that neglect. Pieces were started and some
came close to almost being finished. The groundwork was done for other
bits and bobs that would have led to a steady stream of content over a
series of weeks and months. The site was redesigned and a plan for going
forward with a relatively football-free (for the foreseeable future
anyway) Mossley80 was in place. So, what happened you may ask? The
answer is, life did.
Twelve
months ago I wrote that 2013 was shaping up to be a bad year and while
that was written partly in jest a bad year did come to pass. No, scratch
that, it was much, much worse. No details will be expounded on here
but with everything that has happened the blog, football and other
things too numerous to mention have been the furthest things from my
mind.
There's an argument to
be had that throwing myself back into the things I did for fun
(Mossley80, football, etc.) could have helped alleviate some of the
overwhelming gloom a little. However, being the type of person who is
not very good at compartmentalising their life it's highly likely that
all I'd be successful in doing would be allowing that darkness to seep
into things that should be light.
So
what of the site now? Well, being someone who doesn't believe that
things can suddenly change for the better because a large number on the
calendar increases by a single digit I'm not going to make any promises
for 2014. There may or may not be some content on here over the course
of the next 365 days that doesn't consist me explaining why the site has
been so quiet. I just don't know.
What
I can say with some degree of certainty though is that I'm determined
to try and shake the metaphorical pitch black cloud that's been hovering
overhead for a good length of time now. It's not going to be easy and
to be honest I don't rate my chances of success that much but it's the
first step - even if it is a shaky one - in something approaching the
right direction I've attempted for a while. That may bring about the
catalyst needed to spring this site into life once more. It's just a
question of wait and see.
If things don't get better then in all likelihood it will just fade away. Some may take pleasure in its
passing. The majority though will remain as indifferent to it as they
were while it was in its perceived heyday; barely giving it a second
thought as it vanishes quietly into nothingness.*
Not for the first time on Mossley80 a short message seems to have gone on a lot longer than I'd originally intended. If
for some inexplicable reason you're still reading at this point after
all the doom and gloom above, I'd like to thank you for doing so and
wish you a Happy New Year. The law of averages say someone has got to have one so why not you? :)
** See! I can still do football!