for posterity
Apr. 4th, 2011 11:26 pmLivejournal seems to be imploding gradually as the days pass so it occurred to me to move my blatherings elsewhere, ignoring the fact that I have not blogged in at least a year. I would be more exact, but I can't exactly check LJ due to their aforementioned epic fail. To be perfectly frank, I am only here now because I am depressed and I don't want to actually tell anyone I know because they would either overreact or not react at all. You might think it odd that there'd be such a significant disparity in people's reactions, so I should be more specific. Specifically, my mother and close friends who live oceans and continents away will overreact and fear for my sanity (I'm not even exaggerating; my mother called me five times last Saturday in a sudden fit of paranoia that I'd gone and killed myself). In contrast, my not-so-close friends who live here (and, possibly, my father) will, at best, say well-meaning but ultimately trite things about how I have nothing to worry about and everything will work out in the end. At worst, they'll steer the conversation towards their own life crises, which they sincerely believe to be worse and more urgent than mine. I will not dispute the validity of their beliefs because I honestly do not believe that my problems are worse than anyone else's. That is a vanity I hope never to cultivate. And I am probably being extremely unfair to this subset of friends, but it must be made clear that I am not impugning their characters so much as I am being realistic about the how close our relationships are. By some stroke of misfortune, the companions I grew most attached to for the past few years are the ones who chose to leave for greener pastures and I am left with people who know me but never got to know who I am. With options such as these, my only recourse now is to simply put my thoughts down on (virtual? metaphorical?) paper and hope that it will provide some modicum of comfort.
I used to keep old-fashioned journals as a child and teenager (and how times have changed so drastically that paper and pen are now considered by many to be quaint and almost obsolete). I don't remember why I bothered to take one with me when I moved away from home, considering that I already had an LJ at the time. I'll sidetrack a bit and say that if I had to make up a reason, it would be because I love writing - not just in the sense of stringing words together into coherent units, but also the act of drawing letters with ink. And I will be completely honest by saying that I love writing with pen and paper because I love my penmanship. It's one of the few things I am genuinely proud of, as strange as that sounds. I tend to deflect praise and compliments given about anything, but I gleefully accept comments about how my handwriting could pass for computerized font. Going back to my point, I still keep one old journal around even though I haven't written anything in it in years. In fact, I have always kept it out of sight, though I don't think it was ever a conscious decision on my part. This might be because I can never stop myself from crying when I read it. It probably says something about my childhood and life so far that the entries in that journal are by and large distressing.
This brings me (finally, circuitously) to my point: I don't want this journal to end up like that. I realize this is not the most auspicious of beginnings but who knows? Perhaps this will act as a catharsis of sorts, like sterilizing a festering wound. I don't even know how often I'll be inclined to air my thoughts out in the open. But maybe it will be enough to know that this journal will be here, listening when no one else can or will.
I used to keep old-fashioned journals as a child and teenager (and how times have changed so drastically that paper and pen are now considered by many to be quaint and almost obsolete). I don't remember why I bothered to take one with me when I moved away from home, considering that I already had an LJ at the time. I'll sidetrack a bit and say that if I had to make up a reason, it would be because I love writing - not just in the sense of stringing words together into coherent units, but also the act of drawing letters with ink. And I will be completely honest by saying that I love writing with pen and paper because I love my penmanship. It's one of the few things I am genuinely proud of, as strange as that sounds. I tend to deflect praise and compliments given about anything, but I gleefully accept comments about how my handwriting could pass for computerized font. Going back to my point, I still keep one old journal around even though I haven't written anything in it in years. In fact, I have always kept it out of sight, though I don't think it was ever a conscious decision on my part. This might be because I can never stop myself from crying when I read it. It probably says something about my childhood and life so far that the entries in that journal are by and large distressing.
This brings me (finally, circuitously) to my point: I don't want this journal to end up like that. I realize this is not the most auspicious of beginnings but who knows? Perhaps this will act as a catharsis of sorts, like sterilizing a festering wound. I don't even know how often I'll be inclined to air my thoughts out in the open. But maybe it will be enough to know that this journal will be here, listening when no one else can or will.