Today’s #gardening #hobonichi #techo page. Another productive afternoon in the books, as it were. instagram.com/p/xXUL_HNUxF/
Category Archives: writing
Twitter Avoidance
I hadn’t realized what a habit it’s become to just pick up my phone and launch up Echofon. I justify it by saying that Twitter is where I get my news. Plus, no one has a personal blog anymore, so Twitter is where I go to find out what people are doing (instead of Facebook).
Truth is, it’s just a habit. A ritual. And like all habits and rituals, it merits some reconsideration sometimes. Why am I really doing this? Should I do it differently, or not at all? Continue reading
The Perils of a Personal Blog
I’ve been abstaining from Twitter this week and documenting my reactions to not having an instantaneous outlet. Long story short, I’ve realized how passive-aggressive or narcissistic I must seem with nearly every post. Jerkwad on the highway honked at me; got stood up for lunch; gained 0.4 pounds this week.
But isn’t that my whole blog, too? Look at me! This is my life! This is my son, my yard, my house, my family. This is what I do, who I am, how I spend my time.
Whenever I sit down to write a blog post lately, my husband asks whether it’s about my braces, my gardens, my weight, or our son. That’s pretty much what I blog about lately, because that’s what I do.
I guess I just need to remember that my blog is for future me. If I stopped blogging altogether, I’d be pissed at myself for losing that searchable record of what happened when. When was Connor potty trained? How long did I fight with these gardens before they became my own? When did I reach my goal weight? If I stop blogging, I lose the answers to these questions.
I don’t know. It still seems petty on some level.
Less Communicado
Doing a little experiment this week. Going to see how Twitter avoidance changes a) how much time I spend dicking around on my phone, and b) the frequency and content of my blog postings.
I mean, if someone mentions me, I’ll check Twitter, but I’ve moved my Twitter client of choice off of my dock area and onto the next-to-last page of apps on my phone.
Back in the day, I used to keep blog notes in a running email to myself or on scrap paper. These days, I have an open doc on Google Drive that serves the same purpose. We’ll see if collecting ideas throughout the day instead of spewing them raw from my brain changes what I say and how I say it.
Getting Back To Blogging
I never got used to typing on a laptop.
The keys are too short, and I have to keep my nails trimmed just so. I’m never sure of my posture and position — sitting cross-legged on the couch with the keyboard propped up on my foot, or hunched over my coffee table? I feel like I should be laying on my stomach, as if I were scribbling in my longhand journal, if I’m not sitting at my computer desk.
And then there’s the trackpad. Don’t even get me started. When I’m presenting from my laptop at work, I have to bring my mouse to the meeting to keep myself from looking the fool on-screen.
I guess where I’m going with this is that I really miss blogging.
I seriously have dozens and dozens of topics I’ve saved up for a rainy day — 43 saved in a Google Doc, 32 listed in my TeuxDeux app. The only ones that actually get written are the time-sensitive ones, and even those get delayed sometimes, almost to the point of no longer being relevant. (My monthly “Dear Connor” posts were originally supposed to go up on his monthly “birthday” of the 3rd, but they rarely get posted that early in the month anymore.)
The topics I have saved in my Google Doc are the ones that usually get posted, since I take a few minutes during my lunch break at work to write a paragraph or two. Over time, I get a coherent blog entry that wasn’t written half-assed while my son was watching Dora the Explorer, or in that last 90 minutes of Mommy Awake Time after I put him to bed (which is not quality thinking and writing time, generally speaking).
Once he’s asleep, I feel comfortable with going into the home office sans baby monitor and playing on my desktop computer. Lately, though, he’s been fighting sleep, and I’d rather not have to string up the baby monitor in the hallway to keep an ear on him if I can just hang out in the living room instead.
Right now, I’m sitting sideways on my couch, cross-legged, laptop propped on my left foot, leaning against some throw pillows, with a Sleepy Time tea on the coffee table beside me. My brain is fighting me, and my iPhone alarm is telling me that bedtime will come sooner than I think, and my left leg is starting to go numb — but I finally had to write.
I write for myself. If others read what I write, then they’ll get an insight into my life. Some might find my end of things exhibitionistic, or the readers’ side of things voyeuristic (or stalkery). I’ve been making my private journal public for over ten years, though, and I’m unlikely and unwilling to stop now.
I write for my current and future self. I write to get it out. I write so I’ll remember the important things. I write so I have record of who I am and what I’m thinking.
I get frustrated with my past selves (because haven’t we all been different people at different times in our lives?) for not recording important events like moves, separations, holidays. I don’t want future me (or future Connor) to get frustrated with current-day me for not writing about the important things — or the everyday things, which can be even more important.
It’s time to make writing a priority again. Not because I set myself a goal or a not-really-a-resolution, but because it’s important to me. Because I should.
Because it’s part of who I am, and who I have been.
I’ve got to clear all this shit out of my head.