I keep sitting down to write a post and then getting a bit paralyzed. Part of the problem is that when I wrote about
giving up the hootch, it got a little more attention than I bargained for and now I feel like I'm under a microscope. Blogging is tricky because, to me, it doesn't feel so much like writing for a public forum as it does writing for a small community of readers whom I've come to think of as friends; so I spill my guts and assume twenty people are reading it. My husband says that I have to have some boundaries when I blog. I need to be a bit more protective of the information I release to the public because once you hit publish, pretty much everyone has access to it: friends, strangers, assholes, parents, media etc. I can see his point.
Sometimes I have no filter. I write about what I'm going through at the time and I don't always know what the hell I'm talking about because I'm processing while writing. There's a lot of good in that too, don't get me wrong. When I was in the hospital, in limbo, awaiting the birth (at any moment) of preemie twins, your comments and emails were what I clung to, what kept me hanging in there without going completely crazy. When the girls were colicky and I was crying myself to sleep every night, it was you guys that told me you'd been there and understood. This is LA so I don't have neighbors who pop on by to help out; hold a baby or hold my hand. I have a keyboard. Thank God.
When I make a new friend, I like to get right to the good stuff: what are your demons? Have you done things you regret? Like what? I don't give a shit that you backpacked through Europe when you were eighteen. I want to know if you've ever had an abortion, if you've ever slept with someone whose first name you never bothered to learn, if you hated your step-father. I want to hear the juicy shit that makes you who you are. I do realize that not everyone is like me. But blogging has a way of attracting like minded people who get me as well as the people who find my style of writing and relating completely inappropriate. Writing books is like that too except that when I write a book, there is more space between the event I'm writing about and the expression of that story which allows me to much more easily add humor and levity to it. In comedy we call this "tragedy plus time." Like for instance 9/11. It's only now that we can see how hilarious that was. Okay, very bad example.
So the drinking thing: maybe it was too early to write about quitting because I would hate to have anyone looking to me for answers or thinking that I'm judging their drinking or giving anyone a reason to judge me or make assumptions about what I was doing or why I decided to quit. When I talked about drinking before (in books and on my blog) I believed in everything I was saying. Alcohol was an
enhancement to my life, a fun part of it - until it wasn't. That's all. I've only been off the sauce for three weeks. I know nothing. So possibly I will refrain from discussing everything that comes into my head at every moment at least until I've given it some time to percolate.
So, have you ever slept with anyone without knowing their name? DAMMIT. Don't answer that.
Sometimes I have no filter. I write about what I'm going through at the time and I don't always know what the hell I'm talking about because I'm processing while writing. There's a lot of good in that too, don't get me wrong. When I was in the hospital, in limbo, awaiting the birth (at any moment) of preemie twins, your comments and emails were what I clung to, what kept me hanging in there without going completely crazy. When the girls were colicky and I was crying myself to sleep every night, it was you guys that told me you'd been there and understood. This is LA so I don't have neighbors who pop on by to help out; hold a baby or hold my hand. I have a keyboard. Thank God.
When I make a new friend, I like to get right to the good stuff: what are your demons? Have you done things you regret? Like what? I don't give a shit that you backpacked through Europe when you were eighteen. I want to know if you've ever had an abortion, if you've ever slept with someone whose first name you never bothered to learn, if you hated your step-father. I want to hear the juicy shit that makes you who you are. I do realize that not everyone is like me. But blogging has a way of attracting like minded people who get me as well as the people who find my style of writing and relating completely inappropriate. Writing books is like that too except that when I write a book, there is more space between the event I'm writing about and the expression of that story which allows me to much more easily add humor and levity to it. In comedy we call this "tragedy plus time." Like for instance 9/11. It's only now that we can see how hilarious that was. Okay, very bad example.
So the drinking thing: maybe it was too early to write about quitting because I would hate to have anyone looking to me for answers or thinking that I'm judging their drinking or giving anyone a reason to judge me or make assumptions about what I was doing or why I decided to quit. When I talked about drinking before (in books and on my blog) I believed in everything I was saying. Alcohol was an enhancement to my life, a fun part of it - until it wasn't. That's all. I've only been off the sauce for three weeks. I know nothing. So possibly I will refrain from discussing everything that comes into my head at every moment at least until I've given it some time to percolate.
So, have you ever slept with anyone without knowing their name? DAMMIT. Don't answer that.