I <3 My Blog

I've been a writer forever. I am much more comfortable with words on a page (or screen) than with speaking. I hate speaking. You don't have the proper time to go over what you exactly want to say, and it's much easier to be misinterpretted. Also, words on a page offer no more or less than what they are. If I speak to you, I can give myself away. Facial expressions, tone of voice, eye movement, body language, all these things can get in the way of proper communication.

I think by writing. I figure out what I think by writing. Words on a page are malleable, making thoughts more malleable. I don't feel bound to the last sentence I wrote, because I can go back and change it. If I am speaking, I might feel pressure to follow a line and maybe get lost along the way.

My mom terrified me with the gross powers of speech. The ability of someone to start talking about one thing and within minutes to be somewhere completely different, with no sign posts to see how you even got there. Her mind is cyclical and everything jumbles together for her. She can't talk about one thing without backtracking to cover 10 others.

I have inherited this disease from her.

But I can fight my disease with the page, the screen. I can dig through the junk drawer, tossing things aside, looking for the thing I can't remember that I wanted, what I really wanted to say.

Or I can ramble if I want, slowly moving in until I find what it is I wanted to say. That is the beauty of my blog. I can grab thoughts that are bouncing around in my head and fling them onto the page, working them into some form of coherence, purging them from my mind.

And I'm not sure exactly what it is about my blog that is so satisfying. It gives me something that tupperware tubs of notebooks and folders and folders of word docs can't provide. Is it more a sense of permanence? Cohesion? Is it the audience factor?

The words suddenly have more weight because people will see them.

Is it that part of my that wants to reach out and touch people that is so infatuated with my blog? That small, broken part of me the bigger, rougher parts slap down, saying, Bad, bad, when will you learn your lesson?

I feel like my blog could get me in trouble, but then I feel like I don't care. These words are mine. They are me, put down, time stamped. This is what I was thinking at 4:06 pm on Tuesday Nov 1, 2005. This is what was on my mind. This is what I cared about enough to type it up and post it to the internet.

The posting is the difference. I have reams of shit I wrote down that I may or may not stumble across again some day. I have things I am working on that I'd like to publish. This is the middle ground. This is my work out room. I wouldn't put anything here I want to publish, but I also wouldn't put down complete nonsense rambling. This is where I flex my muscles, sometimes working harder, sometimes less. I am accountable, but not judged.

I <3 You Blog