Egads and gadzooks!

Oh!  Er, you are here, reading this!  This first bit of the first post on my blog!  That... is exciting and unexpected and a little bit embarrassing, since I can't even think of a proper first sentence.

Having to write the first sentence of just about anything is a lot of pressure, really; whole books have been written collecting the most arresting of First Sentences, and most of those didn't even need to contend with the nearly nonexistent attention spans of readers in the age of the miraculous interwebs.  Are you still reading?  Really?  Oh thank god, the first sentence managed at least that much.  Please do stick around - it gets better, or at least less insecure and wishy-washy, I promise.  Probably.

Sidenote: I really love the Beatles and 

will use pretty much any excuse to insert

them into whatever is being discussed.  

Just so you know.

Anyway.

I spent a while thinking about what the first sentence of this blog should be.  What is the blog about?  Well, me, essentially, but that seems narcissistic stated by itself, so probably there should be more to it... But I suppose that's the problem: I'm on what could either be described as an epic or a wildly flailing journey to figure out what the More is.  

You see, a few months ago, my life imploded.  I thought about that as a first sentence, actually: "I'm Pearl, and a few months ago, my life imploded."  But no, that pretty distinctly sounds like the voice-over at the beginning of some sort of teen drama starring improbably attractive, well-dressed and coifed people who are just minding their own Wacky High School Hijinx lives when The Town's Big Secret Comes And Changes Everything, or it turns out that at least a few of them are supernatural beings in some way, or maybe they just all have a lot of simulated on-screen sex or what have you.  

Rrrrrrowwwww not actually a teenager
so I can find him attractive, plus... kittens.

I am... *ahem*... well, not a teenager, to say the least, I don't live in a small town that is likely to have a big secret, I am constantly noticing with consternation that I have no supernatural powers whatsoever (nor have I walked through a magic wardrobe or mirror, found a magic lamp... you get the idea), and I am not particularly unattractive, but I do have a sort of weirdly lumpy profile, in my opinion, and I think anyone who saw me would agree that I am far from well-coiffed.  So First Sentence 1.0 is right out.  Back to the drawing board.

Another Sidenote: I really love sloths. 
Have you seen that video with Kristin Bell
being overcome by her love of sloths? 
I identify heavily with that video.

"Do you like Hyperbole and a Half but wish it were way more verbose and did not include all those delightful drawings to break up the walls of text?  If so, this blog might be just what you're looking for!"  That was an obvious no-go, even if one were willing to overlook that it's technically two sentences, which is cheating.

Sidenote the third: In case you can not tell,
I have a great fondness for GIFs. 
This is unlikely to change.

"Hi there."  Okay, that's at least inoffensive.  "Hi there - I'm Pearl and I simultaneously do not have amnesia and do not know who I am."  No, wording is bad, syntax is awkward, just no.  No.  This is going poorly.  Maybe this whole thing was a terrible idea; how would I know?  I don't know what I'm capable of - I know what the old me was capable of, before I went by Pearl, before the whole life implosion and whatnot, back when I knew who I was and I actually had a relatively successful little blog (at least within its niche), among other things - and if I can't even come up with one good sentence...?

Okay, you caught me.*  I have no intention of coming up with a good opening sentence.  Sue me.  If there's one thing I remember about old me, it was that I was somehow Good At The Internet despite not ever doing any of the things one is supposed to when writing for internet things.  I do not like to write short filler things (although vignettes that are actually interesting are fair game), I do not like to make lists just because "people like lists," I do not like to break up what I write into the tiniest paragraphs possible or edit out half of what I want to say out of fear of the dreaded "Wall of Text" label, and most of all I just really, really do not like being told what to do.  I mean, I'm a big fan of teamwork and leadership and all sorts of things that many people might find a bit dorky, really, but on the whole, I hate being told what to do, I really, really hate being told what to do by authority figures who clearly are just enjoying wielding said authority, and I to-a-somewhat-lesser-extent-but-still-formidably hate being told that I need to follow conventional wisdom on pretty much anything.

*If you did not in fact catch me, that is okay, I actually have no idea how anyone perceives anything.  But it worked as a transition, no?

 P.S. Yes, I know that regardless of whether you prefer footnotes or endnotes, the middle of the page is not where this sort of thing goes, but it turns out that this is my blog and I can do what I want, so there.  Harumph.  Unless I want to make the line spacing on this bit of text smaller... Apparently that is beyond my limited Internetting capabilities.

LONELY ISLAND YESSSS I LOVE THEM SO MUCH AND ALSO JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE AND JULIAN CASABLANCAS AND EVEN MICHAEL BOLTON HIS COLLABORATION WITH THEM WAS HILARIOUS

.

..

...

*ahem* 

Right.  Moving it along then.  

So this is my first post, sans Impressive First Sentence (and apparently with the highest use of Caps For Emphasis ever; sorry, I'll work on that), sans lists or brevity or even a specific subject, really.  It's just me, talking to you, whomever you are.

Thanks for being here, by the way.  Things have been really, really rough for the last very long while, and as much as I have developed a knack - dare I say a flair? - for endlessly ruminating on How It All Went Wrong, Etc., it is nicer to talk to other people.  Even random internet people.  Even imaginary random internet people, presumably, as I don't really know how anyone would stumble upon this blog; I'm not going to advertise it, I am 100% not about to look into SEO, I have no money (or inclination) to get someone else to do either of those things, and, well...  it's just not going to be that sort of blog.  It's going to be a blog about whatever the latest thing I'm exploring is as I try to figure out who Pearl Zare is.

I'm not going to write what my "real name" is; right now I barely feel connected to the person who used that name anyway.  I certainly don't want comparisons being drawn - if nothing else, it would taint the discovery process, don't you think?  I'm just going to be here being me, whatever that turns out to mean, reaching out to talk to you.  I apologize that the conversation will necessarily be largely one-sided.  It's kind of how the whole blogging thing works, unfortunately.  But if you are reading and you care, then you can bet that I will care about what happens to you, too, even if it's only in the abstract.  Caring and empathizing and helping, those are things I value, and that I still know how to do, of that I am sure.  The rest?  Well, I hope you will join me.  This feels like the right place to end this little beginning of a blog, so I'll save the story of how I got here (the basics at least) for the next post, and just go with the only First Sentence draft that almost made the cut - somehow I like it better as an ending.  

Here goes...

Hi there.  I'm Pearl Zare, and I'm really happy to meet you.