I’ll be honest with you here–the main point of this entry is that it pushes my emo outburst about what is (essentially) merely a hilarious mishap a little further down the page. The further I get from that throat sinking moment when I read my name on her wall, the more trivial the whole giant ick feels.
And so, with that, we bid it adieu. And we laugh at it as the door hits its giant butt on the way out. (Not that the person in question HAS a giant butt, just that it’s a good figure of…you know what? Forget it. We’re moving on.)
I’ve been debating with myself lately about just how open and transparent I can be here, now that I have real, actual people who are not related to me reading the things I write. [Which, sidenote, I checked out my stats on this page for the first time ever and was kind of taken aback by the IP addresses I knew didn't come from Stanford or people I'm sure I know. Dudes, one day, 45 whole people came here! 45! I know this is small potatoes, but there is no way I can name 45 people who come here because I told them to. Anyhow. This (of course) doesn't mean that I don't WANT you here, random people, because I do. I wuvv you. It's just kind of creepish that I don't know who you are.] Anyhow. Back to the subject at hand: my internet honesty.
For instance, if I tell you about boys who are current rather than past objects of my obsession, will this make me obsess about them more, or WORSE, will they READ it? I can no longer gossip about my friends because they (and people they know) read this, I can’t really whine about my life because I do that anyhow in real life, and who wants to hear me whine about the same thing twice? (No one.) In short, can something so public be confessional any more?
Do I spend too much time thinking about this? (Yes.)
How do you guys deal with the private and your blogging existence? I mean, aren’t the private squishy gossipy things the interesting things? Is there anything else left?
Basically everything anyone could want to know about me is on the Internet. I don’t embarrass easily (or rather, I’m always embarrassed, which is basically the same as never being embarrassed), so I just pretty much put it all out there. I like when other people do the same. I like knowing intimate, painful, boring, or embarrassing details about people’s lives. The only things I hold back are things that I think might hurt other people. It’s a shame I’ve never really been single since I started blogging in earnest, because I think it would be totally rad to have a guy find out via the Internet that I liked him. Even if he didn’t like me back. It would just be such a good story. And think how awesome it would be if you were just surfin’ along and discovered that someone had a crush on you. Hella sweet! I have quite a few friends who are strangers who I’ve met online because I was stalking them or they were stalking me on LiveJournal. I wish I knew how to check my IP stats and shit. 45 people? Dude, I’d kill for 45 people!
I agree. The minute you start to censor the minute you lose your story & it stops being interesting (like that could even happen, but still). I guess this gets to be the point at which you commit to saying what you want to say, or making this a forum for something else.
Instructions for baking perhaps?
I guess this means I should start spilling more of my guts, then. I still think there are a few things I don’t quite want to tell the internet, but I can definitely up the ante a notch without causing myself any immediate or serious trauma.
This is a problem I’ve wrestled with a lot too. I started blogging after I was already in the land of jobs, so on top of personal angst I had employee/freelancer angst. My website was professional and personal all at the same time. In short, my blogging suffered.
Now my life is much less prone to involve violent lapses of judgment, strange dating situations and/or things that are illegal in Singapore. My advice is to treat the best (and most personal) stories as writing challenges. How can you keep them fresh and alive for us without ruining your own life? It’s a question of style and delivery.