What am I doing here?
I know pretty well what I'm not doing here: grading papers, doing research, planning classes, and attending committee meetings, all important things. So one of the things I'm doing here is avoiding other things I ought to be doing.
But I'm not the only one. I've been looking at a bunch of academic blogs, trying to discern the parameters of the beast, and while many are informative, insightful, or entertaining, many others could be summed up thus: "Students are stupid! Administrators are morons! I, on the other hand, am pretty darn clever!" While this type of rant may have its place, this isn't it.
But what am I doing here? Thinking out loud? Writing things down so I don't forget them? Preserving my brilliant thoughts for posterity? As far as I'm concerned, posterity can take a hike. Posterity cares about dead people, so my advice is: when posterity comes knocking at the door, take a flying leap out the nearest window.
I like the way one of my students described what I'm doing here: "Modeling the life of the thoughtful writer." Sounds nice, but it's not something I can say out loud in the kind of conversation that comes up in the faculty lounge:
"You have a blog? Whatever for?"
"I'm modeling the life of the thoughtful writer."
My interlocutor would spit Diet Coke out her nose.
So I guess I don't really know what I'm doing here, but I know I'm enjoying it, and that's got to count for something.
Now where are those papers?
4 comments:
I think I blog as a way to stretch my muscles for some serious writing. Unfortunately, I'm giving it all the diligence of my workouts...you can see how much weight I've lost! I think I need to begin to write again, something other that silly reports that no one reads and grant proposals. I need to express something, but I can't quite figure out what it is. Hence, I have two blogs: one for personal reasons and one for professinal reasons. They're both getting a little heavy around the middle from the lack of recent workouts.
In the little relativistic World of Lani, enjoying what you do is everything rather than merely the something we often assign to it. That said, then, on the student end of the blogosphere, I have been writing one for 5 years and truly, I think it's personal evolution on paper. I'm loathe to ever write about my day, as who wants to read my grocery lists?, but to record interesting or funny or thought-provoking questions or events is important! It's horribly embarrassing to read things I wrote in say 2001 or 2002 and I'm always a little weirded out when other people read it, but to see how exactly I've matured in my personal and burgeoning professional lives is pretty extraordinary, truth be told. Plus, I'm a huge geek, so there's that. If Jonathan Franzen can read to learn how to be alone, I think I'm safe in saying that the same can be done on the opposite end of the page--even if the page does happen to be in pixels. (Also, I'll respond to your email shortly!)
I blog for two reasons, or that is to say I have two blogs for two different reasons. Blog one is dedicated to updating those long lost family members about the goings-on with my family. Simply put, they should all WANT to know what my family is doing and I don't have the time to email them all. I know of only two people who have read it. There's a reason for that, I suppose.
My other blog is mine and mine alone - where I really cut loose and expose the parts of me that I long to expose - yet cringe when they're actually out there on the table for all to read.
Your blog, Bev, is like your classes (well, the two I've been in anyway) - informative, entertaining and at times (most), a bit off the wall.
A "blog" is just that--a web log. An early ship's log is the protoblog or the model blog; it contains the captain's perceptions of events as they occurred, supplies as they were available or scarce, crew morale and behavior, and the captain's personal interpretations of the events that occurred. A blog is the same thing--it's a record of the thoughts, events, and emotions that occur, "logging" these varied elements of life for future consideration. Both the captain and the blogger cannot truly understand the purpose of the log until it has been kept for sufficient time to reveal existing patterns . . . and only when both captain and blogger understand the patterns of daily life can either one work to break those patterns.
O Captain, my Captain, soldier on against the snowballing soap operas. Your work is never in vain. =)
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