15 days ago, I was asked if I wanted to join in a greeting video for a friend whose birthday is next month. Her husband is collecting short videos from friends and relatives, to edit them together and show her on her birthday.

I filmed mine yesterday and when I was finished I wondered how could I have waited two weeks to do this. Well, I wanted it to be perfect. And the previous days I would always find an excuse not to do it. I look bad today. My hair is a mess. My energy is low. It’s raining. I forgot.

The embarrassment of missing a deadline was a powerful thing for me when I was in school, and still sets me in action sometimes. Yesterday at 16:00, with two hours of daylight left, I wrote a draft of what I wanted to say in my notes app and went to the park near my house. I brought my Panasonic Lumix DC-GF9, a camera I use when I want to take quality photos but don’t want to carry something as big as the DSLR. But I quickly decided I wouldn’t film the video with it because, carrying the camera at arm’s length, the shot was not flattering at all. So, I switched to my Google Pixel 6a, found a nice spot with some trees in the background, and talked to the front camera.

I took three takes of about 10 seconds where I say something like “Hi! Happy birthday, I hope you’re having a beautiful day with your family. I’m sending you a big hug, and I hope we get to see each other a lot this year.” *sends kiss to the camera*

And just like that, I had another reminder that when I postpone something, it’s not because of laziness. Just a fear that a first step is not worth it if the result is not going to be perfect. But these are tasks that don’t need to be perfect. I’m not checking the pieces of a rocket I’m sending to the moon or performing brain surgery. I’m making a video. My friend will be happy to see people who love her in it and won’t care about any flaw. The video doesn’t have to be perfect. It just has to be done.

“I’ve read that it’s terrible.” Well, me too. But when it comes to cinema, TV shows, and music, not paying attention to bad reviews has often brought me nice surprises.

I’ve finished watching Squid Game 2 (I won’t spoil anything), and I’m surprised because I liked it so much. Yet, the only three opinions I saw on Instagram stories were about how much they hated it or had to stop watching. As a Steam user, I’m used to reading very negative reviews of video games I enjoy, and I know that most of the people who like something don’t express it too often on the internet. Or if they do, their opinion is not as intense as the negative ones.

Last year, one of the times when I didn’t pay attention to bad reviews, I was, in fact, in disbelief that such a movie made it to the cinemas. It happened with Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis. Watching it is an experience difficult to explain. It gives the impression that the filming must have been a headache for everyone except the director. But I won’t tell you not to watch it. It’s an experience like no other. And at least I can say, “I watched it in the cinema,” when it becomes a cult film. That’s something I wish I could say about The Room by Tommy Wiseau, named one of the worst films ever made. It didn’t even make it to theaters in Spain, but I watched it at home and can say it made me feel things: nervous laughter, second-hand embarrassment, and a desire to recommend it to anyone who, like me, enjoys trash culture.

This is the first time I’m writing a blog post in over a decade. I back up most things, including most of my blog entries between 2003 and 2010, and I’ve come across them a few times. Whenever I’ve faced them, I’ve had a strange feeling.

On one side, like many people looking back at their younger selves, I cringe a bit over what I wrote when I was younger. On the other side, I admire the creativity and fun behind those posts. I can tell that the person behind them was someone who practiced often and read a lot.

I’ve set up this blog to have the chance to express myself on the internet in ways other than tweets or Instagram stories. I want to realign some of that focus that I’ve given to social media over the last few years. I think writing long-form texts often, whether online or in my physical journal, does the mind good.

I plan to give the address of this blog to just a few friends and maybe post the link on Blogroll.org after I’ve written some entries.

I will try not to worry too much about my future self finding cringe what I write now, or that my friends do. And I know they won’t. 5 years into the future, will I stand by everything I’ve typed today, and also not find it cringe? Probably not.

But one thing that’s recently changed is that, with help, I’m learning to be more compassionate toward myself, and my past self. And I won’t judge someone who was excited about writing in that cool thing that the internet is.