Sunday, June 25, 2006
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Silent Blogging
I've decided this is a Quaker blog.
I was born and raised as a Quaker, which is among the most abstract of all religions. I kid you not. Sitting through a Quaker Meeting for Worship (aka almost complete silence for an hour, with others) was pure pain when I was a kid, but now that I better understand the concept,* I like it a great deal more.
In any event, I have decided my approach to blogging is Quaker-ish because I only post something when I feel like it. Often times, I don't feel like saying anything at all for months on end.
The conventional wisdom is that if you want people to read your stuff, you must update frequently. After months of ceaseless (& ineffective) nagging on the part of my superego I've instead determined that:
1) This is hooey,
2) My purpose in writing is simply to write -- or as Cyril Connolly
more eloquently noted: "Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self." (NB- it does nonetheless make me happy when you read it), and
3) I don't want to talk just to talk. I would rather say something when I feel like it. Otherwise, I think I'll just do something else. The world is noisy enough as it is.
...As long as I'm launching this mini-manifesto, I will also assert that I am not in any way required to say anything important. Of course, if you have ever read this blog before, you know this has always been my modus operandi...
*(Remember, Quakerism is highly abstract ....concepts really matter.)
I was born and raised as a Quaker, which is among the most abstract of all religions. I kid you not. Sitting through a Quaker Meeting for Worship (aka almost complete silence for an hour, with others) was pure pain when I was a kid, but now that I better understand the concept,* I like it a great deal more.
In any event, I have decided my approach to blogging is Quaker-ish because I only post something when I feel like it. Often times, I don't feel like saying anything at all for months on end.
The conventional wisdom is that if you want people to read your stuff, you must update frequently. After months of ceaseless (& ineffective) nagging on the part of my superego I've instead determined that:
1) This is hooey,
2) My purpose in writing is simply to write -- or as Cyril Connolly
more eloquently noted: "Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self." (NB- it does nonetheless make me happy when you read it), and
3) I don't want to talk just to talk. I would rather say something when I feel like it. Otherwise, I think I'll just do something else. The world is noisy enough as it is.
...As long as I'm launching this mini-manifesto, I will also assert that I am not in any way required to say anything important. Of course, if you have ever read this blog before, you know this has always been my modus operandi...
*(Remember, Quakerism is highly abstract ....concepts really matter.)
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