Distraction is the essence of procrastination
Writing a blog post a day and 1677 words a day suggests that I should ruthlessly excise all distractions from those few hours I laughingly call free. (You! The hour between 10 and 11! I call you Free! Mwa ha haa ahha.) And to rock that boat, enter the NaBloPoMo randomizer which is a nifty thing which you can click and click and click until your clicker is sore, surfing through all the blogs of the bloggers who are blogging once a day. It's unbelievably obsessive, so much so that I have twice failed to go get a cup of tea, having instead sunk into the bottomless clickpit of bloggy goo.
Surfing too many blogs is bad for my head space. I have occasionally found blogs randomly which are good. Mostly, however, I find good blogs through good blogs I already read and like. Some days those circles feel small and self-maintaining and I longingly think of the outer blog world where lurk as yet undiscovered blogs of grace and alien beauty where inspired knitters knit and parents parent and commenters comment, or even blogs where no one talks about children or knitting much at all. Yet, when I venture into that space, I get confused, overloaded and weirded out pretty quickly.
Because let's face it. A lot of blogs are pretty dull.
I know this. You do too. What I don't know is how to tell the difference. Even an excellent blogger can write a dull post while a normally dull-as-dishwater blogger can sometimes have a moment of genius. I flick past a dozen or so blogs and feel compelled to stop and comment on maybe one or two. And as the blogs flash past, I glaze over and wonder who we all are and what we are all doing sitting at our computers, writing about what we ate or what happened at the drive-in or what new and spectacularly stupid thing Bush said today. What is the point? Wherefore blogging?
It's like looking at an enormous apartment building and dreaming about what marvellous stories are unfolding in all those windows. To actually knock on each door would reveal not a Neil Simon play but a world of ordinary people in ordinary lives.
And yet... and yet. And yet our very mundaneness is our humanity. All our stories are much the same and yet so different, each worthy of being told. And each story is the most important story -- to the storyteller. This is what rescues me when I start to doubt the point of blogging or when I start to panic about creating a post of genius. This is my window. That is yours. I love peeking in windows and am happy for you to peek into mine. The story in me respects the story in you.
NaNoWriMo thought for the day: I am "behind" on words. I am choosing to think this is part of how a mother of young children does NaNoWrimo -- in bursts of energy when there is time rather than in slow and steady application. It's like children and trying to get a balanced diet into their vegetable loathing selves. You drive yourself crazy if you try to get them to eat right and enough every day -- but measure it over a week and things pretty much work out. And measure it over a lifetime and they're feeding themselves far longer than you're feeding them.
Surfing too many blogs is bad for my head space. I have occasionally found blogs randomly which are good. Mostly, however, I find good blogs through good blogs I already read and like. Some days those circles feel small and self-maintaining and I longingly think of the outer blog world where lurk as yet undiscovered blogs of grace and alien beauty where inspired knitters knit and parents parent and commenters comment, or even blogs where no one talks about children or knitting much at all. Yet, when I venture into that space, I get confused, overloaded and weirded out pretty quickly.
Because let's face it. A lot of blogs are pretty dull.
I know this. You do too. What I don't know is how to tell the difference. Even an excellent blogger can write a dull post while a normally dull-as-dishwater blogger can sometimes have a moment of genius. I flick past a dozen or so blogs and feel compelled to stop and comment on maybe one or two. And as the blogs flash past, I glaze over and wonder who we all are and what we are all doing sitting at our computers, writing about what we ate or what happened at the drive-in or what new and spectacularly stupid thing Bush said today. What is the point? Wherefore blogging?
It's like looking at an enormous apartment building and dreaming about what marvellous stories are unfolding in all those windows. To actually knock on each door would reveal not a Neil Simon play but a world of ordinary people in ordinary lives.
And yet... and yet. And yet our very mundaneness is our humanity. All our stories are much the same and yet so different, each worthy of being told. And each story is the most important story -- to the storyteller. This is what rescues me when I start to doubt the point of blogging or when I start to panic about creating a post of genius. This is my window. That is yours. I love peeking in windows and am happy for you to peek into mine. The story in me respects the story in you.
NaNoWriMo thought for the day: I am "behind" on words. I am choosing to think this is part of how a mother of young children does NaNoWrimo -- in bursts of energy when there is time rather than in slow and steady application. It's like children and trying to get a balanced diet into their vegetable loathing selves. You drive yourself crazy if you try to get them to eat right and enough every day -- but measure it over a week and things pretty much work out. And measure it over a lifetime and they're feeding themselves far longer than you're feeding them.
posted by Francesca Amendolia at 14:13
14 Comments:
Oh, I love your description of blogging as peeking into apartment windows! It's perfect and so true!
I get the same sense of overwhelment, as if I am missing so much, but yet can never keep up. Great post! I can totally relate to it. Our windows must be in the same virtual apartment building.
I clicked and clicked and clicked and clicked. Nothing clicked with me, though, until click #47, which was your little window.
It's worth thinking about, once in a while: why we do it. There's never any one reason, of course. I had my defensive reasons when I first started: it's so my sister in Montana and my mother in Maine and my friends in Alaska and Japan and Argentina can keep track of me and my life. But my main audience turns out to be me. It's my way of finding out what I am doing.
If people stumble in and appreciate what I'm doing, great. But the main reason ought to be for ourselves, to turn our own lens back upon ourselves, to reverse the peephole, if you will. As soon as it stops being fun, I'll stop.
And I'm finding NaBloWriMo to be a blast, much to my surprise.
Sorry to ramble on in your comments, you stranger. But your discussion of blogging struck a chord with me. Thanks.
I couldn't agree more, getting lost in the blogosphere (am I the only one that still sincerely enjoys that word?) is overwhelming and underwhelming in the same instance.
But what I still treasure is the happenstance of finding great words, such as you posting a comment on one of my good friends blogs, and then just clicking onward and onward.
I try not too worry too much in the meaning of my blog or blogging in general. Aren't we all too close to be able to judge on the infamous question "What does this all mean" anyway?
Oh, ain't it the truth? I am still trying to get at the heart of blogging. Still trying to figure out what is OK to share and what isn't. As long as I just blog about what I finished knitting, or just frogged, or just spun up--fine. But when I start writing about parenting, I totally freeze up. When I talk about my family life, I totally freeze up. When I talk about my academic life--same. Who on earth do I want to admit to my real world? But then again, who on EARTH would be interested in my mundane stories of what I knit in a day? Do I really want THEM part of my world? So I question occasionally WHY I blog--and occasionally the only answer I come up with is because it keeps me sane. What on earth does that mean? I love the above answer: "But my main audience turns out to be me. It's my way of finding out what I am doing."
HI! I found you through a comment you posted on mine, which sparked another post for me. It's about some other Canadians I've met travelling and how they are apt to beat your with a Canadian flag... oi they irritate me (and I"m Canadian).
On to larger topics, I am doing the NaNoWriMo too, and the words? Oh they're not coming so fast. But I take solice in that 1600 isn't that much and I can catch up.
well off to write.
cheers,
Dea
This post spoke to my little blogging heart. You said it wonderfully.
Who do I write for? Well, originally, I wrote for the family, but now, yes, I write for me. For a while, the comments spurred me on, but now I think even without comments, I have found a way to express myself, and I love it. Sometimes mundane? Sure! Always cheaper than therapy? Absolutely!
Oh, my gosh. You know what this is going to do, right? It's going to make me love all these new bloggers I find (who find me, too! Thanks for the visit!) and then have to quit my day job.
You're a great storyteller. Very funny.
I like what Richard Bach's character said in Illusions - we do things for two reasons, to learn or to have fun. I write for both reasons - to learn who I want to be next and to have fun becoming her. (Of course, I'm not trying to write a couple of thousand words a day and raise small children at the same time, though I've done both in years past.)
You write so well that I imagine you have fun doing it. It's always a pleasure to come here to read, so I have fun, too - thanks :)
Mundanity = humanity? I'll buy that. Everyone and no-one is special.
As to the blog phenomenon, I was listening to Peter Gabriel's second album today (back when he didn't give his albums titles) and enjoying the following song, which is about an earlier generation of self-expression through electronic media...
"On The Air"
Built in the belly of junk by the river, my cabin stands;
Made from the trash I dug off the heap with my own bare hands.
Every night I'm back at the shack, I'm sure no one is there,
I'm putting the aerial up, so I can go out on the air...
On the air
On the air
On the air
Every morning I'm out at dawn with the dwarfs and tramps
For a silent communion lit from above by the sodium lamps.
Everyone I meet on the street acts as if I wasn't there,
But they're all going to know who I am, 'cos I can go out on the air.
[Chorus] (On the air...)
Leaving the car down the leafy lane,
Turning out Tarzan for my Jungle Jane.
Anyone at all, from Captain Zero
And his band of superheroes standing by on call.
Oh it's not easy,
No it's not easy making real friends...
Don't give me your steak-reared milkboys, milkboys,
Half alive on empty white noise, white noise,
I've got power, I'm proud to be loud, my signal goes out clear,
I want everybody to know that Bozo is here!
[Chorus]
A commitment to write a post every day definitely has me thinking on this topic. Of course, my thoughts aren't anywhere near as organized and well-spoken as yours but isn't that the beauty of the bloggy world? ;)
So true. When I first started blogging (not too long ago!) I would stare and stare at the computer, totally paralyzed that some random stranger would read and think I must be the most boring person on Earth. Which is probably true. Now I don't really care. No one in my personal life knows that I blog, which is fun, like a little secret, and very few people in the blogosphere stop by. I just blog for myself, to untangle and organize wierd and confusing trains of thought, and to get to know myself better. I seem to have forgotten about me since my kids came along. Thanks for your post, I always enjoy reading them.
my sentiments exactly.
Well said. I write my boring little posts, but I like to think that there's somebody else out there who can identify. There are far too many 'exciting' stories in the news. Sometimes it's nice to just read about the regular ones on people's blogs.
Interesting post, thank you. I often think about this, especially since I just started a blog this month (I had been intending to for a while, and NaBloPoMo gave me the excuse). I frequently do wonder who my audience is, if I expect an audience at all. About half the time when I write I think only of myself, but sometimes I am attacked by the thought of the readers I do not have yet. I'm not sure if I want them, but I find that the possibility of an audience changes my tone and the topics I think to write of. It's different from notebook journaling.
But I also often feel so disappointed with the blogs I come across. I want to find more, I'm sure there must be more that I want to read, but it's so hard to find good blogs outside of the established rings. I don't like wandering through miles of the mundane to find the startling and delightful. I wish someone would just deliver lists of new and intriguing blogs to me once a month or so!
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