Sunday, December 19, 2004
Embarrassed.
Ok, so last night over dinner I told some friends of ours that I'd started this blog, and they went home and read it, and called me this morning to say they liked it. The emotion I'm feeling right now is EMBARRASSED. Totally, completely, deep-crimson-red embarrassed. Like they saw me in my underwear and it was the ugly pair you only resort to wearing when you haven't done laundry in 2 weeks. I like the post I started off with but I feel like my posts have gotten increasingly unspectacular. But then I think, if I'm going to post something daily, it can't be spectacular every time. I have to remember my own disclaimer - that the point here is less profound expression than the profundity of expression itself.
I am sounding neurotic and academic and perhaps this whole self-referential thing is going to get old, so I'll move it along. But this is definitely very weird. And now I'm wondering how I'll share the news of this blog with other friends and family members. Do you send a proclamation? "Hear ye, hear ye, I have a blog." That clearly feels strange, but it seems equally strange to keep it a secret. When I think about who I'm trying to reach, I think 'people I don't know'... but is that just shyness? Cowardice? My husband is a singer, and he always says it's easier to sing for a crowd than for me or a small group of people he knows. It's odd, that we want an audience, and yet we want to hide. Makes me think of the allure of New York - story after story of people who go there for the rush, the excitement, and the ability to be anonymous. To be counted, and yet left alone.
Which makes me think of the book How to Be Alone, by Jonathan Franzen, which is all about public versus private....I find his writing very cold, but his ideas are always incredibly interesting to me, and I remember copying a dozen or more sentences from this book into my journal, including this one: "To write sentences of such authenticity that refuge can be taken in them. Isn't this enough? Isn't it a lot?"
I don't know if it's enough, but it's definitely a lot. Anything this scary has to be important.
I am sounding neurotic and academic and perhaps this whole self-referential thing is going to get old, so I'll move it along. But this is definitely very weird. And now I'm wondering how I'll share the news of this blog with other friends and family members. Do you send a proclamation? "Hear ye, hear ye, I have a blog." That clearly feels strange, but it seems equally strange to keep it a secret. When I think about who I'm trying to reach, I think 'people I don't know'... but is that just shyness? Cowardice? My husband is a singer, and he always says it's easier to sing for a crowd than for me or a small group of people he knows. It's odd, that we want an audience, and yet we want to hide. Makes me think of the allure of New York - story after story of people who go there for the rush, the excitement, and the ability to be anonymous. To be counted, and yet left alone.
Which makes me think of the book How to Be Alone, by Jonathan Franzen, which is all about public versus private....I find his writing very cold, but his ideas are always incredibly interesting to me, and I remember copying a dozen or more sentences from this book into my journal, including this one: "To write sentences of such authenticity that refuge can be taken in them. Isn't this enough? Isn't it a lot?"
I don't know if it's enough, but it's definitely a lot. Anything this scary has to be important.
