When a blogger does what LeBron can't...

11 May 2008. My Graduation Day.

Instead of boring you with sappy memories from the past four years, I decided to switch it up.

That's right, there will be no NBA videos in this post...just words and snapshots.

To paint a better picture of myself, I'm going give a quick history of Odenized because its life exactly coincided with my time spent in higher education. So if you're interested in the riveting story of Odenized and the man behind it, please read on...

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If you stumbled upon these pages before, say…2008, you might have noticed this blog had no videos, far too much orange and green font and maybe an unhealthy saturation of hoops poetry.

Oh, and this blog wasn’t called Odenized.

At 18-years-old, I decided that by the time I graduated, I would be poised to become the next Marv Albert (minus the sex scandal)…or maybe more appropriately, the next Jack McCallum.

At the time, my hoops knowledge stemmed mainly from commissioning an ultra competitive high school fantasy basketball league, letters to the SLAM editor, frequent participation on the (now defunct) SLAM3 forums and watching 300+ consecutive Bulls games during the mid- to late-1990s.

Plus, when I wasn't writing, I played the game a little bit. You could say I had hops.

I started writing weekly columns on my fantasy league’s website in 2001. Unfortunately, that writing is all lost on old, family hard drives and remembered by only a handful of my closest friends (you know who you are…thanks for always being there, guys).

My writing was semi-private – available only to the members of my fantasy basketball league (considering its quality back then, this was probably a good thing). I tried my best to emulate the works of the basketball disciples at SLAM, especially Scoop Jackson whose pieces were as revolutionary as the throwback jersey.

I had no idea what a blog was in December 2004, when I emailed a Chicago journalist about how to get my name out as a writer. I told her I knew I had the talent, and I was aching to share my thoughts, but I had no idea where to begin.

So this print journalist sagely recommended I go online and set-up an account with Blogger. I took a good three days pondering the name of my blog…and I came up with something uber-original:

The InkSpot. Hell yeah.

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The first sentences I wrote on this blog were, “I was really hoping for a nice pancakes, eggs and bacon breakfast this morning. So much that I even dreamt about it.”

The article was a plea similar to that of many Celtics bloggers today – Kevin Garnett for MVP (Steve Nash won his first that season).

I continued to write about all things basketball (you can still hit the archives to get a taste of what I’m talking about…most links are still live). I leveraged my writing samples to land columnist jobs all over the net.

Just four months after my first blog post, I was writing for 11 sports publications…for free.

And fall semester ’05 came. My summer of deadline writing, daily collaboration with editors, interviewing NBA players and coaches, live-blogging the 2005 Draft (Deron Williams, represent!) as well as the 2005 NBA Finals had to come to an end.

I was done just as quickly as I started. It was a good run, I thought. It was time to focus on my sophomore year.

Time past…well, time flew! I took some more classes. Many more hours. Focused a bit on life and its meaning. Became vegan, raw foodist, vegetarian, meat eater. Got into comic books. Parents divorced. Accidentally knocked out my tooth. Got a false one. Met some people. Let some go.

Quite honestly, it got crazier than a day in the life of Dennis Rodman.

Two years came and went, jam-packed but very empty. Two years that definitely left their mark.

I realized through the years, tears and changes – no matter how much I tried to evaluate and re-valuate life – basketball was something that truly mattered to me. A constant. A home.

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Exactly three years after publishing my first blog, I came back. I felt like (and here’s the sappy part that my graduation allows me to say) I was resurrected. During those years off, I hit the lowest point in my life, and somehow I found a way out.

I gave The InkSpot a new name, a fresh design and a new M.O. – Acting the Chameleon.

I can't guarantee Odenized is here to stay. Who knows, you might see an entirely new domain name in another three years, doing something completely opposite than YouTube videocapping.

Whatever it is, you can be assured it will reflect who I am at the moment. It's crazy, but when you look at this blog, you're also looking at a snapshot of me.

If University has taught me anything (other than getting a degree is as easy as Dwight Howard dunking the ball), family is where it’s all at. This weekend, I'm spending some long-overdue time with my mother, father, sister, brother, aunts, cousins, grandparents, close friends…you get the picture!

Anyone who’s close – I want to see and hear from you this weekend!

The NBA will always be a love of mine; there’s no questioning that. But family and friends are what matter most.

I know other bloggers are in the same boat, and even more will graduate in the near future. They too will be deciding how to balance their life and work with blogging.

There's no quick and easy solution.

But regardless of who you are, whether you blog or not, whether or not we’ve met, try to spend time with the people who care about you this weekend...

Tassos Melas, I know you feel me.

11 May 2008. Graduation Day. Please excuse my brief absence.