I wasn't trying to keep this blog secret, exactly. I mean, it's a blog, fer Chrissake. This is the Internet. How secret can it be?
Yet, in some respects, blogging feels very private. I guess I self-censor more than I would in a private journal, but when I'm writing a blog post I don't really think about anybody reading it. It's very odd, since for so many years in my day job the first thing I had to decide was who I was writing for. Now I guess I'm writing for me, although I don't know why I would want to do that. I put things in this blog that I wouldn't want people who know me to know. But since this is a blog, and this is the Internet, people I don't even know might read it. Somehow, that's OK.
I was a little disconcerted, the other day, to find Scarecrow reading this blog. I never told him about it, though I didn't make any particular attempt to hide it, either. It's not that I didn't want him to read it. There's nothing in it he doesn't already know, nothing I wouldn't want him to know (I went back and checked), and I didn't say anything bad about him (I checked that, too). I just didn't think he'd find anything of interest. I guess I was hoping to spare him having to listen to some of this stuff in person. It's OK. It just feels a little weird. Now, when I'm writing a blog post, I'm aware that someone might read it. Weird.
While I'm vaguely on the subject of family news, Tuffy came home from the gym a few days ago with a hematoma auris, more commonly known as cauliflower ear. Eewk. When she was wrestling in junior high and high school she always wore ear guards, but apparently for mixed martial arts it's not the done thing. So she had it drained, and she has to wear a very awkward pressure bandage around her head for the next nine days in the hope the perichondrium will reestablish a connection with the underlying cartilage. And it hurts.
I have not asked whether she plans to wear ear guards from here on out, because sure enough, if I do, she won't. Her birthday was last month, but they don't stop being teenagers on the day they turn 20.
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9 months ago
It does change it doesn't it? There are a few folks I wish didn't know about my blog (my bad). I censor myself a bit more. I need to get over that.
ReplyDeleteOne of the reasons I STARTED my blog, was that I had retired and when spouse gets off work, well, didn't seem right to start in on a non-verbal personality with my verbal self. NOW she too is retired and reads my blog and it does filter me a tad. Like you said, nothing she hasn'r already heard or any secrets...just, and now some cousins are reading it and...it is far from a diary, though I never wanted to write a diary, did that for 30 years...always thought it was history for my kids, but when I realized kids were not in my future and all neices and nephews could care less into their 30s--L with it. So, I blog, and then I wanted to help people (read "help people" with a sacrcastic/dopey tone, as it is so "ME" as I've been told, but I no longer am fond of the label)so I started a 100 chronic illness list which took FOREVER to finish and I had read hundreds of blogs and ie really sapped me. Exhausting to read about so much illness, suffering, and so many blogs had gone on for years with NO COMMENTS, not one and some the person had died--ALS, Huntington's, AIDS, and loved ones kept it up with sad music---sigh. But my point is---your DAUGHTER was a wrestler and now martial arts? No wonder you love that burger butt, certainly not needed for protection reasons! And now *I* am worried I said something to offend Scarecrow...oh the web we weave when we think we are just us.
ReplyDeleteWhat! My mom and dad can read my blog! O gosh, o golly . ... (that would bug me)
ReplyDeleteIt is a strange moment when you figure out that others have found your blog LOL
I seem not to be bothered by the other half reading etc. But not really into having my internet name associated with my "real name" in full.
thank goodness it is not broccoli ear - the green would clash.
Jan
Zoom - I read my posts to Skip intermitently. This provides some togetherness in the experience as she hears what I've written and we can talk about how it makes us feel at the moment I've read it. She especially likes to hear the comments.
ReplyDeleteSome friends read the blog and use it as a way to find out what's going on with us. Honestly, I find it a great means to let friends who are interested know what things are like at a deeper level than we'd normally chat about. But they don't have to read it if they don't want to. My parents and siblings know of it; siblings have given it a look,parents are not technologically savvy enough to get to it.
I have made a conscious decision to make sure no one at work knows about it. Since I have many work colleagues and some clients as facebook friends, it gets no mention there either.
Donna - I don't know that self-censorship is bad. The 'net is a glass house, and I never thought that sounded like a very comfy place to live.
ReplyDeleteDiane - Yeah, Tuffy started wrestling in fifth grade, and wrestled all through junior high and high school. UW doesn't have a wrestling program, so she does MMA instead. And now she's assistant coach at the junior high. I guess that's what happens when you're an only girl, and your dad was a wrestler.
Jan - Fortunately, my mom is computer-phobic, and my dad is a hardware guy -- he spends most of his time taking it apart and putting it back together, so it rarely actually works. And cauliflower ear, when it's fresh, looks more like eggplant and broccoli (eewk).
Cranky - I think that might be one of the differences between a girl partner and a guy partner. Even if Scarecrow and I read my blog posts together, we would be unlikely to talk about the way they make us feel. Scarecrow is a guy, and they teach them in Guy School not to do that.
Zoom - Oh yes, I agree self-censorship on the net is a good thing. There are some big, big challenges on this journey that I don't go into on the net -- too personal or too legal.
ReplyDeleteFor the most part, I'm not self-conscious about the blog in regards to people active in my life now. They're interested and comfortable with my journey -- they see the good days and the bad. In fact, some post topics come out of my conversations with them. Am sure this would be very different if I lived with someone.
Rather it's the few folks from my past who are no longer in my life but know about the blog. From time-to-time I think of them when I'm writing. They're not around anymore for a variety of reason. Some appear uncomfortable with where I'm at. Those are the people who I need to get over what they think about the blog. Hmm, your comment got me thinking about this -- thanks.