Nil by Mouth

the kind of unimaginable yet

the kind of unimaginable yet totally obvious thing has happened. People are reading my blog. i wanted people to read it, of course. that’s why i made it public, put it on the web, submitted the link.. i imagined people i didn’t know stumbling across these pages when they were bored, or when they were supposed to be doing something else. and getting caught up in my life just a little bit. the way i explore other people’s blogs, journals and homepages. i love the web for that. i love how it allows us to expose ourselves in this semi-complete, semi-finished way. W and i were talking about design once and he said something like,

“the thing with computers and design is that everything has the impression of being finished and considered.”

for better or worse. maybe this is why i like printmaking so much. the process is so long and arduous, and that’s just the production part. a lot of thinking and changing and “art” gets made in what can really be called the drudgery of the process.

but anyway, so people are reading: friends, acquaintances, strangers, and my parents (arg). of course the folks are horrified and worried, but aren’t they always? i got a freakout e-mail from my mom to this effect a few days ago. the strangers reading though, i think that’s really cool. kind of what i wanted. the friends and acquaintances i always worried about. would they think i was silly and lame deep down? putting a few paragraphs up a day about what you are really thinking is a lot of material for someone to judge you by.

so i’ve been thinking today and yesterday about why i’m doing this. what i wanted from it. and what it has given me so far. i guess when i first started i was having a sort of boy-induced self-esteem crisis. i wanted to write to give my own thoughts and feelings some weight, as they were being so utterly ignored by, what felt like, the rest of the whole god damn world. a few days later, everything was intensified by the news of my office being closed in July. a lot of what i’ve written is sad, and down. i’ve been sad and down. the world is a difficult place, even for the young and cheery.

it’s become something really nice for me, every entry. i think about the events that i’ve gone through and what they mean to me, what they are teaching me, and how i am relating to the world. it’s not about gossip, or venting, or saying anything. that bad things can make a good blog entry perks me up. and thinking that i can make something just by noticing and putting it down makes me proud.

now i try to write in my paper journal and i can’t do it. i can’t imagine not linking, not putting in pics, not bolding for emphasis!

also, because i don’t allow myself to gossip or vent, and i try not to talk about particular people in any way beyond retelling of an event, this has forced me to think about things a bit longer, maybe in a more finished way.

anyway last night i went to a yankee game with a bunch of friends. six out of seven of us were unemployed (or imminently unemployed). it was pretty funny, in a sad funny kind of way. i think i got sick though. there was a lot of yelling because someone on the yanks hit a grand slam. we sat behind the road crew for oasis, the band. they are at radio city now i guess. most of the guys were english, they were loving the game, but wondering where the fighting was. heh. i have a lot more impressions on yankee stadium. it was my first time there, but i have a tennis date in a bit. i’m hoping not to be too rusty…

• Jun 7