My comment:
I have kept a diary every year from 1987 to 2004. In the year my parents divorced, the gaps grew longer so that by the last two years, I was only writing it when I went on holiday. As you know, with big life changes and emotional trauma, one's priorities and focus change.
Then this year I discovered blogging, a new and necessary outlet. Not only an outlet for frustrations, but a forum for sharing thoughts, beautiful things and happiness with friends and other people who appreciate them.
I enjoy re-reading some of my posts. Others embarrass me, but what is written I will not erase because I meant it all at the time. Now that we blog, we are exposing some of our inmost thoughts to public scrutiny. Some people don't monitor what they write at all. Some maintain a purely public professional writing front. The rest of us keep a balance between the two extremes. There are many things I wish I could say in one or other of my blogs, but I do not, in deference to the feelings of some of my readers. In these cases, I write it on paper, the way I sometimes jot down ideas for real blogs, but after a few days of re-reading it, I will screw it up and throw it away. That is my personal therapy, I suppose.
The strange thing is, a blogger may only restrain the free flow because of readers he or she knows personally. It is much easier to let go when you are read by complete strangers whom you know will not judge you because they do not know you personally - although, because of what they are reading, they know you in ways even your parents do not.
There are so many complex levels of intimacy, aren't there?
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Some of my best composition is done in my head while in the shower, or on my pillow before I fall asleep. What I blog there is sometimes lost, but often the spirit remains so I can capture its shadow the next day with my keyboard.
I am rather disappointed that my mental writings are more concise, compact, efficient, and well-constructed than my written blogs -- see, even now the sharp entry I had in my head is dissipating as I knew it would -- so that by the time you read it, it has become rather rambly.
8 comments:
Well you know I think you're not the only one there. When I am about to fall asleep and I start dreaming I often think to myself Wow what a great idea I am so gonna be rich, but when I wake up and remember the dream, the so called great idea has no chance in a world governed by laws of physics. At least it's cool while it lasts :o)
I, by my very nature am a hoarder. Diary's I've never been good at keeping, but, back in the early 90's I started keeping an electronic diary on a bbs [mono? anyone remember that? Didn't think so!] I kept it for a couple of years, much the same way as I do now with my many blogs.
Recently one of my blogs self destructed. They do that. One minute they're there, the next. BANG! [But I saved everything I wrote, alas comments were lost] I have wrote why I did this, but, I think I got scared. I realised that, for everything I'd said in my blog you could work out who I was, where I lived, where I worked, what times of day I would and wouldn't be home and so on and so on. And that's without any real effort. So it went. What has replaced it, I think, is therapy. Less day-to-day chitter chatter [but I've another blog for that anyway] and more soul searching, ideas, and just what is wrong with the world anyway.
When you read that one, you realise I have exactly the same problem as you Olivia, I have a plan. I have a shape. I have something I'm going to commit to electronic paper... but halfway down I get sidetracked and before you know it the end has little if nothing at all to do with the start.
I think it's a sign of intelligence, constantly flicking from one idea to the next. To wit, it's a good thing.
M.
Dammit, do I call you Rox or Posh???
Anyway, here's another thing - if I've been out window shopping, when I close my eyes at night, I see textile patterns or clothing designs.
Mas - oops, Neil. You lot have too many names and aliases.
By the way - it was you who commented under my Goddess rant! I knew a complete newbie wouldn't say "you know me".
You didn't used to come around here when I used to write my "circular" blogs. Every section was different, but they were all related and tied up at the end somehow.
I write like that when I am at my happiest, which has not been lately.
I'm always finding the oddest connections between vastly different things. Results of an IQ test for me once said I was strongest in Pattern Recognition, which is a building block for logic and denotes the ability to create order out of chaos.
I understand where you're coming from. I think some people use blogs as emotional outpourings, and I feel uncomfortable and slightly put upon reading that kind of thing. I know it's probably wrong but in my opinion, the Blog is in the public domain so while primarily it should be for you, you definitely need to consider the fact that others will be reading. I try my best to inject some form of humour no matter how whiny a particular entry might be so that when people read they don't stop coming back. I guess it's all down to the 'purpose' of your blog that we discussed all those weeks ago. For me yours is balanced beautifully between the personal - things that are only fully recognisable by those that know you - , The general and the professional.
It's a good thing, even your personla stuff is accessible, juts only fully by your friends. this si as it should be. I don't put much of the professional on my blog a) Because I am in IT and it really isn;t that interesting, also most of my readers aren't! b) That's not what my blog is 'about'
Anyway, I may have missed the point here but I am a little high on a bizarre cocktail of cold remedies on soup, so it's not my fault.
Ditto, Olivia, down to that bit about composing in my head! Beautiful entry.
Same policy about not erasing/deleting anything that's written, no matter how incongruous or moody they seem in retrospect. I won't censor what I thought appropriate to put down in the first place.
Oh Yeah i forgot that bit. I also will not delete entries for exactly the same reason. It's important that your blog reflects you in some way I think, and part of that is your ups and downs.
Merserene & Matt - you two made my day by using the word "beautiful" to describe my blog! Thanks! ;)
Olivia,
I agree with you that one walks a fine line if one chooses not to blog under a pseudomym.
I have to ask myself everytime how much I can say without getting into trouble - especially if one lives in a country like i.e. Pakistan.
I know (and my sitemeter tells me so) that I am read by a lot of people who know me personally - and it is extremely interesting to note the comments of the expatriate community here in Karachi who, though outspoken when I talk to them face to face, have a total mental block and seem incapable to leave even a tiny two-liner or so beneath my posts.
You should know by now that we all adore your beautiful block - of course, it never hurts to hear it again.
Cheers
Helmi
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