Well, I had a thoroughly wretched day, beginning with the realization that I've apparently lost a subscriber over that last entry--I thought that one might be a little too angry for the usual tone of my blog--and ending with a prime example of what I hate most about my job--the necessity to go into a room full of teenage boys and tell them they're being bad and have to leave the library. I need a hug, and I miss my mother more than I have in months.
I do worry that my friends will run out of patience for my leisurely cataloging of my issues.
Ariadne,
my oldest friend who reads this guff, can probably testify that I've
gotten in trouble for this kind of thing before: I
bitch and moan for the sport of it, and sometimes someone will take me
too seriously and think that I'm genuinely distressed when I'm not, or
not very much.
Conversely, people tend to think I'm joking when I'm genuinely distressed.
I wasn't trying to complain
about my lack of a love life, just to describe it. I picked poor terms
to do so, I guess. I'm trying to resist the temptation to contact my
late subber to try and explain myself, because after all, this is just
a superficial contact on the internet, not a significant relationship
for either of us. I'm hurt that she misunderstood what I was getting
at, but that's just a blow to my pride; it's my issue rather than hers,
which is why I'm blogging about it instead.
So am I being too whiny? Do I need to cut it out now, and talk about Weird Al for a while?*
I wonder if I should put a disclaimer in the header or the
sidebar, or the "about me" section of my profile here, to the effect
that this is where I bitch and moan, and readers should feel free to
ignore any subject that I've brought up before because I'll probably be
saying much the same thing again. But that's not entirely accurate
either, because sometimes I am genuinely distressed, and can't resist
saying so to whatever audience I have here just as an attempt to
connect with somebody real. There are real people on both ends of
this, something I need to keep in mind before I blithely consign
anyone's well-meant advice to hell when I happen not to agree with it.
Maybe I should just announce on a post-by-post basis when I'm bitching, not complaining.
*I
was amused to see Al referenced in an online
article about film noir.
The author mentioned great mysteries, and gave three examples:
The
Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, and why Weird Al Yankovic doesn't age
like the rest of us.
Comments (10)
I reread that post, because I don't remember it as angry, and I have to say that I still can't see what could have been offensive about it.
My position on the question of whining in blogs (and I've thought about it a lot and blogged about it quite a bit) is "It's my journal; I can whine if I want to." Unlike the physical world, where people can't leave if they find my whining boring or depressing, the blog audience is entirely free to go elsewhere if they are not in the mood for whatever we're writing.
Not that you've been whining.
I saw UHF this weekend and thought of you.
As for the lost sub, you already know that this is your space and you shouldn't censor yourself to please other people.
Maybe, we shouldn't try to give each other advice at all. I'm going on that theory. ... now if only I could actually, you know, stop handing out advice left and right.
sigh.
Anyhow, yes, you are a kvetching hobbyist. Part of your charm, actually. If you didn't kvetch and grump about something, you'd be altogether too pleasant and easygoing (on the surface) to be a believable human being, in my humble opinion. So kvetch away!
Also? libraries are sometimes scary places. TRU FAX. Not talking about it doesn't change the fact that the problem exists. And I, for one, would like to know about your life, not just read beautifully written essays on high-minded concepts, although those can be fun, too, sometimes.
And in conclusion, HI!