Blog Existentialism...

So. Since I've started posting about The Balcony, either my Blog has been getting a lot more hits, or else I'm just much more aware of the number of people that find it by Googling stuff that I talk about here--the play, for instance. The first weird instance was Paul, a friend of Balcony castmate Veronica, who found me while trying to get info on the show, posted a comment, then introduced himself to me on opening night. Quite disconcerting, actually. To be perfectly honest, I quite enjoy it when some strangers, like Meg's friends Megs and Rice, who followed the Blog trail to me and started to post comments--and I've started reading Megs' Blog and posting to it, too--but... well, maybe I'm just more comfortable with distance. I feel like I'm sharing something intimate here (though not as intimate as what a certain belly-dancing friend of mine shares on her Blog, mind you...) with friends and close family, and sometimes with strangers that I'll probably never meet. Either way, it's a comfortable place. But last week, a theatre group from Montreal found my Blog and followed it to Theatre de Boheme's site, and emailed my director, David. He mentioned the other day that he'd checked out my Blog and, frankly, I was mortified. Now, don't get me wrong--David's a great guy (seriously, if you're reading this David, you rock!) but it kind of felt like getting caught in my underwear (ironic, actually, since, in any non-big-budget theatre production, your castmates will see you in your underwear, and it's not a big deal--everybody has to do their costume changes in the same close quarters!). I like David, but, like everybody that I've met in Halifax so far (except Meg and Nikki), he's not really in my comfort zone yet. At least, I haven't invited him in...

So. All this has got me thinking about why I Blog. I mean, if my director and castmates can find my Blog, my students probably can too... and do I want them seeing, say, my Flying Spaghetti Monster rant about late assignments or my appeal for teaching help? Or what about profs and other students in the department, who might read my Rhapsody on a Rejection Letter? And I remember that, one time, when I was clicking around Tania's Blog, I read a story about a guy who had been fired because of stuff he wrote about his job on his Blog. Maybe it would just be safer to start sending all this stuff in an email. The problem, though, with emails is that, first, mass emails suck. I mean, who wants to get their Inbox clogged up with weekly updates on their friends' lives? It seems so impersonal, too, sending the same message to your best friend, your brother, your mom, your parents-in-law, your former harbour-hitchhiking partner, your new friends, your old friends, your former co-bridesmaid, ... you get the picture. And yet, who has the time to send a gazillion personal emails, all telling the same story about the time you got to be an extra in a movie about Vikings? I mean, I love you all (at least, those of you I know and have met in person more than once...) but I know that, as a long-distance correspondant, I kind of suck. I've never much liked talking on the phone (at least, not since I left my 'teens!) and emailing still seems so impersonal to me. But Blogging has the advantage of being able to tell a story once--like at a party, or over coffee. And you guys know how much I love private parties and going out for coffee. Also, I love it when you guys post comments on my Blog--it makes me feel connected to you, to home, to a community. I love it because it feels like I'm actually having a conversation with you. I know that I'm weird about it, that I'm constantly begging you guys to comment on my Blog, but it's because this way, I actually feel like I'm hanging out with you guys, chatting it up, in a way that email and phone calls just can't manage. (Nones, it's breaking my heart that I haven't heard from you on here in a while!) Also, I can share pics without filling up your Inboxes and making important messages from fake banks and porn sites bounce back (because, as we all know, the internets are not a truck!). Frankly, I really like Blogging. More than anything else, it keeps me from getting too homesick. I like reading other people's Blogs (Mom, Roz, Toni and Julie, even though you haven't posted for months, I still check every day, just in case!) and I get so excited when I see that there are new comments on my Blog. So. I guess that's it. I'm going to have to suck it up and risk having my students try and blackmail me for stupid things I post, or have aquaintances tease me about the dumb stuff I say. Hell, this post alone has furnished interlopers with a fair bit of ammo, I think...