Keeping Me Honest
I don’t know why it surprises me when I find out someone reads this weblog. If I didn’t want or expect people to read it, then I’d write in a journal, not online. Over the years, I’ve found I can’t predict who will or won’t read it. There are close friends and relatives who don’t, yet distant acquaintances who do. Then there are also strangers, and others who I’ve come to know in person and online. This strange mix challenges me to try to write things that have significance beyond just my little midwestern life. I began a public weblog to keep me honest about my writing practice. The expectation of M to F posts helped ensure I was writing SOMETHING on a regular basis. And since that something was for public consumption, then it better be of interest to other people besides the ones who liked me already.
Since starting at this new URL last fall, I’ve had it happen not once, but twice now, that people involved with something I’ve critiqued have written to me. Both times, the responses have made me go back to what I’ve written and wonder whether I was fair and accurate. The good news is that the answer was mostly yes. The whole truth, though, is that sometimes things bother me out of proportion (see the topic category of “Weird Things that Bother Me”, for example) and that can skew a review to the negative. I’ll be editing a recent book review because the author asked me to clarify what it was that bothered me. In so doing, I also took the time to clarify what I admired and liked about the book.
I began this weblog three years ago as writing practice, and have kept it (perhaps, no, probably, at the expense of paying writing gigs) because I enjoy it. It is a good reminder to me that not only are people reading, but I can’t know who is reading. If I keep it honest, and fair, and fit for public consumption, then maybe I can please most of the people, most of the time.
And, just in case anyone who works on Battlestar Galactica is reading, I don’t take back my gripe that nothing happened in the first two episodes of Season Two. I was somewhat heartened when two things happened in the third episode–the team got off Kobol and Tigh declared martial law. But so many things happened on the last episode that I can’t even count them; I was thrilled. It was a very slow start to the season, but things look very good again.