#and Tsunku lyrics once again impart unexpected advice

[redfreesias03]

Something Something Something, Red Freesias.

OR: The slightly embarassing-ish result (that's sort of a conclusion?) that I reached after I spent several days thinking in my own way about how things would change if I let it slip that I'm tired of running a blog, while on a road lined with red freesias.

I hate giving up. Like, I'm really bad at sticking to goals, but I hate actually giving them up.

Redfreesias is something I started on a whim because I (in retrospect, rather arrogantly) thought I could share translations that properly showcased the charms of songs I loved. Quickly, it became a blog that translated songs other idol fans loved, because I've always known firsthand how frustrating it is not to know what a song you love is saying. After a couple of years (in which I graduated from high school and college and had increasingly less free time), I planned on stopping, but that would be giving up, so instead it became a blog where I just...self-indulgently posted things I liked at a carefree pace.

Or rather, I tried my best to think of it as a blog like that, but I really can't.

I do my best not to harbor unrealistically high self-regard of my personal relevance as a translator. I've translated a considerable number of songs, but the quality thereof varies considerably, and the truth of the matter is that most of those songs have considerably more-accessible and much more-palpable translations available elsewhere. Conversely, this is something that in the past has brought me endless peace of mind, because 1) if nobody expects anything, you can't disappoint them, 2) they're not likely to demand things and 3) they can't get angry at you.

Without going too into my personal background, all three of those things are incredibly stressful to me, and having people (usually on anon) express feelings to that extent is probably why I've done my best to make my blog a unilateral existence with as little interaction as possible.

Still, as odd as it sounds, I need to admit that I somehow, illogically, expected something.

To be honest, I'm not sure what it was. Praise? Compliments? Maybe something as simple as someone to gush about songs with.

I wanted the blog to be me shouting into the void, but I wanted the void to shout back (but only ever positively).

Typing that out, even I'm aware of how impossibly, obnoxiously contradictory that sounds.

And so I quietly began to dislike my own blog. At a time when so many of my fellow Americans are either unemployed or forced to work in the frontlines of a pandemic, I'm very fortunate to be able to work from home. But logging on and dealing with tech issues I dislike for work and then doing it again "for fun" is decidedly not fun, and so I quietly began to dislike my blog even more.

When something you (and only you) decide of your own initiative to do isn't fun anymore, the rational thing is to stop. But I hate giving up, and so the thought of just...ending the blog, with a whimper rather than a bang, seemed detestable.

But that's just stubbornness, right? SKE and 48 legend Matsui Jurina promised years ago not to graduate until after summer of 2021, but she announced an October graduation for this year. As a devoted fan, all I could think of was good. I'm glad for her.  Overcompetitive, ever-going, eternal-sun Matsui Jurina chose to stop. She prefaced her graduation statement with "I want to muster up courage and take a step forward"–because even when the end looks like a whimper, even when it might look like going back on your word, sometimes it's brave to stop. Sometimes it’s best to put your own likes and dislikes, volatile and everchanging as they may be, first. There's a line that I've come to really like in Momusu's quintessential graduation song Never Forget You that more or less goes "Was it just by chance that we met? Then our goodbye is also just chance."

Redfreesias is something I started as a whim, so isn't it alright to end it on a whim?

Anyway, all of this is to say that I still really like idols, but maintaining this tumblr isn't fun for me anymore, so I'll stop. To anyone who read through this navel-gazing atrocity of a post, thank you. For previously accidentally translations that I never got to uploading, please check the Wayback machine.