May 22, 2008

Love and Blogs and Loving to Blog

Blogging.
Love.
As jakobandjulia can attest, it’s probably not the best combination.
But as parallel ventures, they’ve got a lot in common.

Both are all about exposure, putting yourself out there.
And exposure, and putting yourself out there, means taking a risk.
Risking your reputation, risking your emotions, on something, or someone, that might but probably won’t pay you back.

Online and in love, you have to choose how much of yourself to share. What image are you choosing to present? What is necessary or relevant or even appropriate for other people to know about you? Where do you draw the line?

 Online and in love, anything you post, say, or otherwise express might not be how you actually feel. It might be constructed for someone else’s benefit, or to someone else’s detriment. It might only be part of the story. It might not be what you wanted to say, or what you would say if you stopped to think about it first. It might hurt someone. That someone might be you.

But in both cases, it’s hard to stop. You know posting something or screwing someone is probably going to cause problems or make things worse, but you do it anyway. You get burned, you get attacked in comments, but you keep going back, you keep posting. It’s addictive. It’s a masochistic, self-destructive cycle. More and more, it’s part of our lives.