it's a sickness

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the other day a co-worker was lamenting over some horrific occurrence she had recently endured, and, rather than commiserate, my first thought was, "lucky bitch--this happened to me, i'd have blog-fodder for weeks."

[and look--i still managed to get a post out of it]

degrees of anonymity

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[i know this post is so 2005, but hey--i was late to the party.]

i got some really great, thought-provoking comments to my last post--which (as such things tend to go around here) leads me to this one.

in an increasingly un-private world, the web is one of the few places left where one can still run, hide and completely reinvent oneself--and this is especially true in the blogosphere. from the get-go, everybody has to make a decision: how out-there do they wanna be?

four basic choices:

1. totally anonymous. this blogger keeps his* real and blog-world completely separate; due to the total freedom from inhibition afforded by such anonymity, such blogs are often very controversial for one reason or another.

2. partially anonymous. while his true identity is kept outta the blogosphere, this blogger lets select friends from his real world (and select people he meets online) in on the secret.

i generally find that the most interesting blogs fall into the following categories:

3. partially out-there. this blogger writes as himself--his face and at least some elements of his identity are known to all--but is selective as to what parts of his life he's willing to share with his readers.

4. totally out-there. this guy is open to an extraordinary degree, and lets the chips fall where they may--such blogs, at their best, combine all the best elements of a controversial type-1 blog with a quality of authenticity that the former can't even approach. i know very few blogs of this type (that are readable, anyway).

and then--as in every continuum--there's all kinds of degrees in between, bloggers evolve and things change all the time.

i of course am a type 2. i considered going the type-1 route in the interests of being even more open, but decided against it for a couple reasons: first, because i thought that sharing the blog with certain friends might deepen and enhance those relationships; and second, because i knew that having a few people from my real life looking over my shoulder would be a surefire way to keep me honest. and so far, both have worked out pretty well.

and while, as noblesavage pointed out in his comment, it's true that many blogs are nothing more than glossy sales brochures for their authors, i've always been an underseller. even in the recent posts about the little house, in which i'm ostensibly blowing my own horn, in retrospect they seem more self-deprecating than anything else--but then, i guess that's being authentic to my nature (ok, my sober nature).

once i'm done with this blog, i'd like to be able to look back at it in my dotage and (a) see a tangible improvement in the quality of the writing and storytelling over the course of its life; and (b) recognize those posts in which i talk about myself as being reasonably accurate, well-rounded explorations of my views, character and feelings as i see them--the good and the bad--rather than just some glorified presentation of how i wish my life had been.

that's not asking too much, is it?

[update: for the record, this post has been reworked since its publication yesterday (yeah, i do reserve that right). trust me, i spared you from lameness.]

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* sorry if i offended any womyn--you know i mean you too.