by Apu
Unfortunately, I’ve been a little busier than I expected to be this month. I was supposed to put something out last week and have this close the month, but it didn’t end up like that. Exams, trying to find work, and biology projects have gotten in the way of it. I should have known it would have been too good to be true for me to have more than one piece out in a month. So, instead, I thought I would write something quick about this site, since this month marks the one-year anniversary of Extraordinary Nobodies.
This site has grown at a rate that I would not have expected in the slightest. When we started, I was expecting it to just be something we contributed to occasionally and got a couple of views from here and there. I did not expect to get so many looks that we could actually set a goal something like three times and meet it each time, and then continue growing to where this year seems like it’ll be substantially bigger than last year was. I did not expect that there would be interviews from artists that we’re actually fans of, or that artists would notice what we were writing about them and actually share our writing on their Twitter and Facebook pages every once in a while. It makes no sense to me but we appreciate it.
Last February I was still coming out of the darkest, lowest place I had ever been in my life. I was trying to learn how to communicate again. When Dustin brought up the idea of the site and asked if I’d want to do it, I agreed. More than anything else, I felt like this would be a good way to get out of my head and get some thoughts down. They weren’t even thoughts that really pertained to my situation, it was still nice to have some sort of outlet for something.
I think it’s pretty clear that my pieces for the first few months weren’t the greatest. Like I said, I was still learning how to communicate again. I think around the time of my writing about Kuniva’s first History of Violence project is when I realized “oh, I don’t have to swear a lot and shoehorn cynicism into my pieces for them to be good” and my writing gradually got better. If I compare my latest piece, about hip hop groups, to the one I did about charisma almost a year from today, I see some real progression and growth. I’ve learned how to express my viewpoints more effectively. Hopefully that trend continues.
In the short time that we’ve been doing this, we’ve run into some really good guys who have given us looks that really helped our growth. I would like to send some special shout outs to Prof and Fatt Father. Prof was my first big look, and helped elevate my very first piece to a higher level than I thought imaginable at the time, and I’ll always appreciate that. Fatts has consistently shown us the utmost love since we first started interacting. It’s almost overwhelming to think about sometimes. I, like Dustin, will forever appreciate the support.
Speaking of whom, I’d also like to thank Dustin for thinking to include me as a co-writer when forming the idea for Extraordinary Nobodies as well as being one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I’d also like to thank our editor Emily, who deserves at the very least Bernie Sanders’ idea for minimum wage for having to edit my pieces.
Hopefully I can have a more consistent schedule in 2017 than I did in 2016 with the hiatus I went on after burning out for a time in April or May. In any case, I’m looking forward to the future of this site.
Extraordinary Nobodies 