Well, my original plan had been to do my 100 post memorial on the 100th post proper... but I also wanted to write about a GOOD weekend for a change... so I decided to look at 100 posts in review. It is also close to the one-year mark since I registered "Formendacil" at Blogspot, so one could also call this a "year in review" sort of a post.
Quite frankly, I doubt I'd've made it to 100 posts were it not for the fact that I broke my leg. That completely turned my summer around, gave me far more free time as well as boredom, and prompted a lot more posting in the past six weeks. And, doing the math, at just under a year, 100 posts means that I've been posting, to average the year, at close to one post every three days.
(Nowadays, if it takes me three days to do a new post, that's a dry spell...)
Looking back, particularly over the past few weeks, I'm not really sure how happy I am with all my posts. Quite a lot of them are ones that, even as I'm hitting "Publish" don't really strike me as well-written, and certainly don't strike me as having any real reason to be written, other than the fact that I wanted to.
Now, since my self-avowed purpose for this blog is as much to entertain myself as it is anything else, that shouldn't be a problem... but it is. I've got a clearcut case of authorial egotism, certainly. I like to have readers, and I like to know what the reader thinks. And then I'll go ahead and write whatever I want anyway... but I still like knowing.
In fact, I have to wonder if I'd be able to write this much if I didn't have an audience. Attempts at journaling in the past, even when mandated by Mom in school, never managed to catch--even though I loved writing and I like being able to read memories at a later date. Something about an audience is necessary, which is true about most writing with me. The reason I write LEGO stories may be that I want them written, but they wouldn't get very far without various younger siblings to read them to eventually. That's also an advantage that RPGing has: even when I don't feel like writing, the fact that there's a waiting audience can be incentive enough to make me compose even when I'm lazy and would rather not. (Now, mind you, this is not as strong an incentive as I'd sometimes like, since I still procrastinate horridly on the 'Downs, but imagine me otherwise...)
Looking at the future, I don't foresee a drop off in blogging anytime soon. Certainly, for the rest of the summer my current rate seems a very likely possibility, and though I'm sure I'll slow down for the fall, a pace akin to last semester seems probable. Certainly, I don't foresee this blog dying any time in the next six years or so...
But in about six years or so I'll be ordained a deacon (assuming that God continues pushing me in that direction), and a year later a priest.
What then?
I'm not sure why I'm concerned about this... but I'm not sure how much I'll write, here or anywhere online, about what's really going on in my head. I already have this mental block about lots of people I know in real life (well, other seminarians anyway...) reading these posts--hence why there is no cross-posting to Facebook, as well as no linking there. And while this may just be an odd idiosyncrasy at the moment (the only thing I've really written that I should maybe have kept to myself has been a rant on a situation on the Barrow-downs, and Barrow-downers are the majority of the people who know this site), but when I'm a priest there will be good reason to consider NOT publishing my opinions in a public venue.
After all, when I'm a priest the majority of my posts will deal with my day-to-day life, the life of my parish. When someone seems a bit funny to me, or there's something that makes me rant a little, or I have a disagreement that ruins my week, the odds are high that it will involve my parishioners somehow. Quite frankly, I don't think I'd be able to vent here, knowing that a Google search (or whatever people are using in 2020 to search) for "Michael A. Joosten" will turn up this site (this and the Barrow-downs and Classic-Castle... and I haven't actually done a search lately, so I don't know what else... but just me, basically).
Mind you, that is quite a few years into the future, but I am nothing if not a worrier in advance.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
8 comments:
Heh. I have the same no-cross-posting rule, and by extension of that rule, I haven't joined the Facebook Barrow-Downs group.
And I've also become a huge fan of the Friends Lock feature on LiveJournal...it's very useful for my rant posts that I'd rather not show to the entire Internet.
Hmm... you're right--there is the friends lock feature. Seven years from now, if this dilemma is still around, I may have to do a reversal and post my serious stuff over there... (this is the serious blog by virtue of being the firstborn... and having, probably, fewer readers).
Still, though... I'm not sure I'd want everyone I've friended reading those rants (or, more accurately, KNOWING they were reading them), and I haven't the heart to unfriend anybody...
Maybe I'll just vanish and get a new nickname somewhere and not tell anyone.
There's also a feature that lets you set up different groups of friends so that you can give them access to different sets of posts...
LJ is great.
Tis Tugwubs.
Celuien is right - LJ is brilliant. You could, if you wanted, create a group for each person, and that way individually select exactly who gets to read what.
I have the same desire for an audience.
And you're sensible enough not to write about your flock anyway...
Also, you shouldn't use your real name on the internet. People could credit card fraud you. :)
Not if I don't have a credit card. :p
"Maybe I'll just vanish and get a new nickname somewhere and not tell anyone."
But then... who's going to read your posts? You might as well be keeping a private journal as be completely anonymous. :p
I still have my private journal, though precious little gets written in it. Just the extremely angsty whining and obsessiveness. I too crave an audience for most everything else.
Hey... I haven't seen you online at all, so I don't know how much internet access you have, if any. Just wanted to say I hope that you're having a lovely summer so far, and also that your leg is all better! Later. :)
Keep up the good work.
Post a Comment