David Scrimshaw told me once that despite my cloaked identity it would just be a matter of time until all my friends, family and coworkers found out about my blog. In retrospect, I think he might have been right.
Over time, more and more people I know have learned, through various channels, of the blog’s existence. Most recently:
- A few months ago my son learned about it at a wedding.
- A few weeks ago my boss asked “Are you Zoom??”
- A few days ago my mother emailed to say she liked my blog.
Each time I was startled, and I felt a bit panicky. But it’s a familiar little panic now. I just take a deep breath and remind myself that even though I’m fairly open on the blog, I’ve never truly lost sight of the fact that it’s a public space. (Of course my boss stumbled across it the same week I confessed to having been a drug addict, because, as you know, life is just funny that way.)
I’ve discovered there are things I’ll tell you, dear sweet trusty old internet, that I won’t necessarily tell my family and friends. I don’t why that is. But I guess it doesn’t matter anymore, now that most of my family and friends are here too.
It’s an odd thing, blogging. It’s personal and it’s public, and I often find myself exploring the shifting geography between those two spaces. Where does the personal end and the public begin? How much overlap is comfortable? Is personal the same thing as private?
There’s also the question of other people’s privacy. It’s one thing if I decide to make my own life an open book, but to what extent is it ethical to blog about other people in my life? Different people have different privacy thresholds, and I sometimes find myself trying to estimate other people’s privacy requirements.
I have a friend who got mad at me once because I mentioned in casual conversation with a mutual friend that she was working towards her Master’s degree. I was stunned that she was upset. How was I to know she considered it private information?
While I blog under a pseudonym, I’ve always known that the cloak of anonymity isn’t real. It’s the illusion of anonymity, just a thin veil really. A wisp of smoke, a whispered hint.
Still, the illusion of anonymity is better than no anonymity at all, right? (Or is it? Illusions can be dangerous. On the other hand, they can serve you well as long as you don’t believe in them.)
Have you ever had that dream about walking around naked in public, but nobody seems to notice except you? Maybe blogging is like that. Or maybe blogging is more like the opposite of that, where everybody else notices you’re naked, but you’re oblivous to it.
Do I look naked to you?
I’m pretty open on my blog. I even use my real name. However, if you read it, you’ll be bored to tears. I don’t blog about work or home or friends. I do blog about knitting (albeit not often lately), so I qualify as a themed blog, but that’s a good thing. Otherwise I’d have nothing to write at all.
I have in the past considered anonymity, but I know full well I’d never be able to maintain it. I’ve been trying for about four years to find the balance required for a blog that would make for an interesting read, but have yet to achieve that goal.
I think the pseudonym provides you with a sort of shear curtain. Even if some people know who you are, I and most of the world certainly don’t.
great analogy, the dream and the converse of the dream. I think there is something about writing that leads naturally into areas where conversation would not go. It’s a bit like the confessional, you and your electronic priest. Well, maybe that’s a stretch. But once you start describing and reflecting on things, there is a real pleasure to doing it. And the medium of writing provides that distance that makes it both easier to share those things, and easier to receive them. Which is all good, I think. It transforms from naked to nude
Oy, the cosmic sense of humor of when your boss comes across it.
Yes, it can be an odd sensation to meet people offline who are familiar with online. I suppose as the cross-over becomes ubiquitous, it won’t be odd?
From here, you look dressed.
Well put Janet, from naked to nude.
I’m with Lissa, Janet and Pearl on this one.
Rob says that maybe it is like people who are in interrogation rooms and even though they know that there is a two-sided mirror, they still say things that they sometimes wish all those people hadn’t seen. Not that you have anything to worry about with regard to what you have said in here.
You guys are so wise! Thank you. I feel merely nude now. 😉
That’s the crux of the reasoning behind why I abandoned my previous blog. My pseudo-anonymity that I loved was no longer anonymous enough. Too many people close to me knew of its existence and it was stifling what I had considered to be my honesty.
In hindsight, I am not sure if I would see a lot of those entries as honest–not when they included other people. They may have be frank, but posting about the people I know and love–even in passing–without their knowledge of the blog was inconsiderate at best.
I started over with my new blog, divulged my name, and have become rather more circumspect with what I share. I miss the freedom of letting it all hang out as I tended to do on my last blog, but have really enjoyed the good comments from family and friends following the new one.
Blogging is often like walking along the top of a really rickety fence.