Day two. The beauty of the blank page. (2/1/19)

(Soundtrack: Patti Smith 'Land: Horses/Land of a Thousand Dances/La Mer(de)' Live. 15 minutes of utter genius)

Sometimes I drop hints. Get used to that. They might be hints for something that's about to happen, they might be hints to things that will pay off sometime in the future. Sometimes, as per the last day of the original blog, they may be things that don't pay off for years. I think I might return to that point tomorrow.

Make 2019 seismic, I said. Make change happen, I said. Because I knew what I was doing today.

Today I gave one month's notice on my current job.

The original blog started, in January 2013, with the job that I'd occupied for twenty-seven years being at risk due to HMV's financial issues. That concept may sound familiar once again.

If I'd been writing here in 2014 you'd have realised that year also started with job loss: my career's survival of the 2013 problems had been a tenuous thing. That was okay, I knew what was coming, I was prepared, I had plans. I left my redundancy meeting, I went home, I turned the Mac on and I started writing. And I didn't take a break for two and a half years. It was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I embraced it, I wanted it.

Today is different. Today is totally my choice. Today is me waking myself up. Today is me pushing myself away from the easy option, the comfortable position. Today is me pushing myself away from safety.

I've been in my current job for two and a half years. It's an office job, the first office job I've had since 1986. Very few of my current co-workers know of 1986 other than a time of legend and myth. I was very open when I went into the job that I only intended to be there for a year. That if I was there any longer then something had gone wrong with my master plan. If you want to make God laugh, tell her your plans.

Two years ago, 14th December 2016 to be precise, I was sat in the offices of a film production company in London (actually kind of quite a big deal sort of company, films you'll know about) talking about turning The Comeback Special into a TV project. They had approached me about this. December rolled into January 2017 and it didn't quite work out. One of those things. For the moment.

(Soundtrack changes to a best of Mott The Hoople)

It's a decent job. The company have been brilliantly accommodating. They've been flexible for me, given me the ability to broadcast with The Anfield Wrap and CityTalk during working hours, knowing I'd make the time up. Hopefully knowing I was always extremely grateful for this. And the people are all sound. I'll miss the people. It's not me though. It's not like I'm looking for a career; I'm fifty-five years old. The only career I'm looking for is in the written word - an area where you can work until your senses desert you. I'll happily write until I drop, there's no retiring from this, there are far too many stories to tell, far too many things to say. Far too many things that need saying. And I've decided that I'm saying them.

So, I'm leaving a job. With absolutely nothing lined up. Me and J talked this through over Xmas; it would be easy to stay because there's a salary involved. But two and a half years would have become three and a half, four and a half, would have become pushing sixty. And I wouldn't have been happy with that. So I'm cutting myself loose and throwing myself to the hands of fate, opening myself to providence, putting myself in the hands of the universe. With the absolute knowledge and certainty that it will work. That something will come up. It has before, it will again. The thing you need arrives when you need it. As long as you believe it's coming.

It's coming.

For those on Facebook, why do you think I was quoting Mat Johnson of The The's use of Goethe as inspiration ? (Two days in and I'm referencing Goethe, this place is going to be dead intellectual and possibly a touch bohemian.)

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back — concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too.

All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.

Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.“

This is me beginning. Again.

For those who've seen the Springsteen Netflix special, there's a moment before Thunder Road where he speaks about 'the beauty of the blank page', how the one thing he misses with growing older is the opportunity to fill that blank page.

I'm filling that blank page again. I don't know what's coming next. Apart from the things that I definitely know are coming next, that is. I've got a blank page. What a beautiful, powerful, exciting thing that is. And I get to document it all here.

And that's the real reason I'm doing this again this year. Every day of this year.

This is the blank page. Every single morning it's blank. And every single day I get to fill it with something new, something that wasn't there before.

The possibilities are endless.