I salute you, O fellow toilers in the fields of the blogosphere!
(Actually, I'm shading my eyes... I wanted to get a shot of the "Captain" on the door of what I think was an old police station.)
i. Not Such a Bad Blogger After All
I've been feeling like a Bad Blogger ever since I started work on the French and Indian War this past spring. Once I'm working on some other writing project, I go a bit slack on writing posts.
Ideally, I'd like every post to be a little nugget of wonderfulness, though I accept that most of them will be merely serviceable. Which is OK, but when the ratio of brain power to available time gets too much out of balance, it's frustrating.
I've been wondering if I should just stop blogging.
Then I opened a Facebook account yesterday.
FB is okay--I'm not putting it down--it's just an entirely different thing than the blogosphere. It's like the difference between walking into a crowded party and sitting down with a friend at a coffee shop.
Facebook seems like it could be a lot of fun.
I feel like I'm confessing to heresy, here, but the thing is, for me, fun is not the highest good.
I don't really want *takes deep breath* to be entertained.
I can rev myself up to be engaging and amusing at parties. People have even told me I could hire myself out as one of those party-enliveners. But in fact, I don't much like parties, except to celebrate special occasions (especially ones that call for cake and martinis).
Socializing in groups, for me, is work. Labor. The output usually exceeds the input. Even if I have fun, and I often do, I have to go home and recover.
So, blogging fits me much better. Being on FB is like spending time someplace that doesn't really suit you: you're grateful to come home.
I'm swooning over blogging all over again. The fact that I blog at all, even at quarter-strength, seems wondrous to me. And I'm grateful for you all too, who write--and read!--blogs.
ii. Lonely
Writing comes with costs too, of course.
Like, lately I've been lonely. I'm spending all this time reading and thinking (or, staring into space, mostly) about communication history, and that means I'm alone in my mind a lot.
I meet with friends pretty often, but that's not the same as the default companionship that comes with living with someone, or with having family around you. I don't have much family, besides bink. My mother was my main family, and after her death, what remains is ... let's say, marshy ground. A marsh is a wonderful ecosystem, but you can't find a lot of places to sit.
Lonely is not a bad thing, it's just one state of being. I'm aware I could avoid it.
I spent the other evening with a single friend who is immensely social. I asked her if she's ever lonely. She got quiet.
"I think I stay so busy I never have to feel that," she said.
Facebook is so sociable and friendly--I already have 23 friends, right off the bat--I think it could alleviate loneliness.
But, I don't know...
I see a theme in this blog of me defending (to my own self) loneliness, grief, laziness...
These are low, slow, dark states of being (virtues, even). They are like compost.
I'm always defending them because around me I mostly see lauded the bright, swift, and airy-- the happy blooms in the breeze (or worse, the "you snooze, you lose" mentality)--and I thrash it out with myself every so often, feeling I'm wrong-headed.
Blogging, for me, is in the slow, low realm.
Facebook looks to me like a beach in the sun.
I will visit it, but I really work best in the dark.
(Actually, I'm shading my eyes... I wanted to get a shot of the "Captain" on the door of what I think was an old police station.)i. Not Such a Bad Blogger After All
I've been feeling like a Bad Blogger ever since I started work on the French and Indian War this past spring. Once I'm working on some other writing project, I go a bit slack on writing posts.
Ideally, I'd like every post to be a little nugget of wonderfulness, though I accept that most of them will be merely serviceable. Which is OK, but when the ratio of brain power to available time gets too much out of balance, it's frustrating.
I've been wondering if I should just stop blogging.
Then I opened a Facebook account yesterday.
FB is okay--I'm not putting it down--it's just an entirely different thing than the blogosphere. It's like the difference between walking into a crowded party and sitting down with a friend at a coffee shop.
Facebook seems like it could be a lot of fun.
I feel like I'm confessing to heresy, here, but the thing is, for me, fun is not the highest good.
I don't really want *takes deep breath* to be entertained.
I can rev myself up to be engaging and amusing at parties. People have even told me I could hire myself out as one of those party-enliveners. But in fact, I don't much like parties, except to celebrate special occasions (especially ones that call for cake and martinis).
Socializing in groups, for me, is work. Labor. The output usually exceeds the input. Even if I have fun, and I often do, I have to go home and recover.
So, blogging fits me much better. Being on FB is like spending time someplace that doesn't really suit you: you're grateful to come home.
I'm swooning over blogging all over again. The fact that I blog at all, even at quarter-strength, seems wondrous to me. And I'm grateful for you all too, who write--and read!--blogs.
ii. Lonely
Writing comes with costs too, of course.
Like, lately I've been lonely. I'm spending all this time reading and thinking (or, staring into space, mostly) about communication history, and that means I'm alone in my mind a lot.
I meet with friends pretty often, but that's not the same as the default companionship that comes with living with someone, or with having family around you. I don't have much family, besides bink. My mother was my main family, and after her death, what remains is ... let's say, marshy ground. A marsh is a wonderful ecosystem, but you can't find a lot of places to sit.
Lonely is not a bad thing, it's just one state of being. I'm aware I could avoid it.
I spent the other evening with a single friend who is immensely social. I asked her if she's ever lonely. She got quiet.
"I think I stay so busy I never have to feel that," she said.
Facebook is so sociable and friendly--I already have 23 friends, right off the bat--I think it could alleviate loneliness.
But, I don't know...
I see a theme in this blog of me defending (to my own self) loneliness, grief, laziness...
These are low, slow, dark states of being (virtues, even). They are like compost.
I'm always defending them because around me I mostly see lauded the bright, swift, and airy-- the happy blooms in the breeze (or worse, the "you snooze, you lose" mentality)--and I thrash it out with myself every so often, feeling I'm wrong-headed.
Blogging, for me, is in the slow, low realm.
Facebook looks to me like a beach in the sun.
I will visit it, but I really work best in the dark.
