LJ Idol, 10: Whose LJ is it anyway? Balancing personal expression and friends list sensibilities.

[rm]

As a writer of, among other things, the personal essay, the last thing I am concerned about in my writing is the sensibilities of the members of the unfortunately-named LiveJournal friends list.

Instead, I concern myself with what is the burden of anyone who is a personal essayist. That is, how do I tell the truth and tell it with point and art while also respecting the lives of people who either don't know I'm a writer or couldn't really do much about that fact when they chose to entwine, however briefly, their existence with my own?

It's a complicated question, often ugly, and one I've been struggling with for most of my life.

My ex, Michael, and I, used to have terrible and bitter fights about such things. It is only unfair to say that this is the reason we are not together because that was merely the most obvious symptom of a deeper and all-pervasive disconnect between us.

When you ask me not to write about you, you are asking me to forgo a sense, as if I am blind, as if food is no longer to have taste. I only finish seeing in the telling of the story.

I was very young then, and was, to be amusingly understated, somewhat less than gifted with discretion. But he too was flawed, not knowing the difference between privacy and shame, and using it often, as a weapon against me and how I would live.

Since then, I have come to understand that I will never be able to make everyone in my life comfortable with my words. Similarly, I have come to understand that there is little to be gained by asking permission to do what I do -- which is tell stories.

Some of the most important stories I have told were maybe not so much mine to tell, and my life has become a balance, not between what I may say and what I musn't, but the cost of declaration versus the price of silence.

Similarly, many of the stories I have told and will continue to tell can and do effect how people view me. Luckily, as someone without a traditional corporate job and no desire for one, I can afford certain snap judgments maybe other people cannot. It is not that I have done nothing I am ashamed of, rather, it is that I can think of nothing so shameful, so useless, as silence in the face of even the most fatal flaws. All events are suitable to confession; the trick is finding the manner of it. And the time.

LJ is a medium in which audience and interest is constantly self-selecting. My first account here was as an early adopter, and I have had people reading my journal come and go and stay since then for all sorts of reasons -- some related to my content and some more related to their lives, goals or LJ usage patterns.

As a writer, it is never my job to protect the audience, but to inform and arouse in all manner of what some would view as too limiting a word. As an LJ'er, my concern for the sensibilities of my audience (because that is what a "friend of" list is, although I am blessed that many of these people are also my real friends and intimates), is limited to the basic decorums of this medium -- that is, I use cut tags for images that are not work-safe or may overload someone's technical capabilities.

The rest is up to the reader. As a writer, I've got quandaries enough without taking on responsibilities that truly have no reason to be mine.

Comments

[beemerbike.livejournal.com]

I like this a great deal. Recent events here make this quite personal.

Thank you.

[featherofeeling.livejournal.com]

As...something, as it sounds to be giving my approval after this topic--actually, your thoughts on feedback would make an interesting Part 1 1/2--I think you addressed the prompt well and rather delicately.
Two quick things bothering me (again strange to say after the topic!): "who's" in the title should be "whose" and "'effect' how people view" 'affect.'

The cost of declaration versus the price of silence

I've seen that weighed in so many more areas than storytelling, too. Either that, or as I suspect, storytelling doesn't belong in the little box it's given--ethical questions in it extend into other parts of life because it does too. Anyway, it was well said.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Actually, as far as I can tell, effect and affect are both viable here (and I just checked).

The "whose" got fixed before you finished posting. Ha!

Meanwhile, yes,

I've seen that weighed in so many more areas than storytelling, too. Either that, or as I suspect, storytelling doesn't belong in the little box it's given

I think that's true.

I am working on my personal statement for the MFA right now and I have to write about who I am, why I write and why I want in to this program, and my current opening is:

In my life I do four things: I write, I dance, I act and I fence. Each of these is a way of telling a story; each is a way of having a conversation.

It needs to be finessed like hell, but the gist of the thing is going to be the ubiquity of storytelling and its interconnectedness to physicality.

[featherofeeling.livejournal.com]

Oops, sorry about that then! (This is why I usually don't post things like that.)

Hadn't thought about the connection to physicality so much as how we live our lives to a certain extent as stories about ourselves, and how everything we say can is performed/building characters and scenes and tone. Good luck on the personal statement.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

Basically, this strategy is about saying "no, I'm not hopping around from thing to thing, the things I do are all deeply relevant to each other."

[mme-furiosa.livejournal.com]

I think that is a beautiful, almost poetic way to approach your own living of life. And worthy of applause.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

And hey, does this immunity thingy mean that you won't bye out while you're gone? Or is the timing still wonky? (or, for that matter, do you have to give it away?)

[mme-furiosa.livejournal.com]

Ahh, I have to give it away. But we'll see how the Indonesian internet situation is.

In all honesty, I likely may manage to post, but I feel as though participation is a requisite part of "playing." If I don't have the time or resources to read others' entries, I'd feel like a jerk expecting to stay in just like that.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I think all of us will have periods of time like that, and you're probably not the first. I think the effort of getting a post done while that far out of your usual environment really earns enough respect in a situation where it's pretty understandable why you probably won't be able to make fully informed votes.

[imaginarycircus.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if this is in response to some particular query or not but YES! It is not a writer's job to protect readers.

Also I am curious about your MFA applications. Are you applying to do non-fiction or fiction?

[rm.livejournal.com]

This is for therealljidol. It's the current, unavoidable topic.

I'm applying to a single MFA program for memoir writing here in the city.

I continue to labor on the novel in solitary horror.

[imaginarycircus.livejournal.com]

Ah. I have read some of your posts for that. It has been really interesting.

There are so many good MFA programs in NYC. Some of them will let you do a combined degree in memoir and fiction once you get into the program. I really had a hard time not going that route.

I know you have an editor, but do you have an agent? If you need or want a rec I worked with a great one last year and I am always looking for good writers to send her way.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I don't have an agent, as I don't have anything completed that I'm looking to sell right now, and I've been told not to talk to agents until a project is done done done.

Because of the "genre-bias" that exists against fantasy and the "ughy" subjects involved in my novel, I've sort of resigned myself to working on it in a dark, solitary pit.

Mainly, I'm just applying to the CUNY MFA, as there's no other program in the city I could financially swing without merit aid, and I am not in a financial position to be eligible for any other type of aid due to bad credit, the high cost of living in NYC, etc.

Also, their instructors seem oddly relevant to the themes I play with in non-fiction.

[imaginarycircus.livejournal.com]

There are agents who are more open to fantasy genres, true. And yes, you do not need an agent until your novel manuscript is done. I wasn't sure where you were in the process.

The CUNY MFA program has some excellent instructors, as does the Brooklyn College program. People I know who have gone there loved it. I think Columbia and NYU are hyped more, but students don't get as much time with their famous teachers as they do at smaller programs. My friends who have gone to Iowa report the same problem.

God, I should have done a program I could afford. I'll be paying for this MFA until I am 90. And if I don't finish something in the next year or so I am going to drown myself in the Charles River, at least metaphorically.

[lacombe.livejournal.com]

I was very curious the answer you'd give to this topic- your answer is excellent, in my opinion. It reminds me of something I told my girlfriend when she tried to adopt the healing of my depression as her personal mission: "You can't be responsible for my happiness". There is plenty of excellent writing out there- anyone who dislikes writing or thoughts can seek something more kindred elsewhere.

I know you're a published writer, but I don't know anything further. What do you write?

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you. That's exactly it.

This is where I laugh because I always find a way to do theoretically glamorous jobs unglamorously (i.e., the live insects on my naked flesh in American Gangster).

My thing of note, such as it is, is a Harry Potter trivia book, the first of three: The Book of Harry Potter Trifles, Trivias and Particularities, vol. 1 (2 and 3 are forthcoming).

I've also had a lot of poetry published in small press mags, a couple of short plays (one of which was actually produced by someone other than me), a few personal essays published online, and some short stories -- one in a print anthology and the others in various online things. I'm also a paid blogger for IllusionTV.com and Gather.com. Also, once upon a time I worked for the Associated Press.

So basically, I write lots of stuff. Sometimes people even give me money for it, and I enjoy writing the stuff people give me money for, but very little of it is _why_ I write, and that's why I'm trying to get off my ass about right now, with both the fiction (my novel from hell) and the non-fiction.

Of course this is in a life of a lot of other creative endeavors that some people think are ill-matched and I'm now trying to convince an MFA program aren't.

[lacombe.livejournal.com]

Where can I find some of your poetry and short stories? Harry Potter doesn't especially interest me (sorry), and I've really had my fill of nonfiction reading when I'm in college.

You seem like such an adventurer! I'm jealous of that.

What is your "novel from hell" about? I'm working on one too, but not making much progress. I have my share of other creative pursuits as well.

having just started (last Monday)

[newwaytowrite.livejournal.com]

attending a Creative Non-Fiction class at a community college I really think this is what I am looking at when we do workshop work with fellow classmates.

I hope to become a better writer and a better person by exploring what my voice means to me.

[lordrexfear.livejournal.com]

Straight diggity. I don't think I could be friends with, none the less be romantically involved with someone who stated "don't write about us on any public way"...

Not that it's been an issue. I tend to never write anything interesting life-wise in my journal anymore anyways.

[puppetmaker40.livejournal.com]

Good show.

It is upon the reader to decide what they want to read or not.

[genesisdesire.livejournal.com]

Some of the most important stories I have told were maybe not so much mine to tell... Learning that idea took me some time, and obtaining the practice of tact and decorum. Now I know how to say something isn't mine to say, and I do try to avoid writing certain things. I really liked how you worded this. Brilliant response.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you. it's funny to me, knowing my own history, that I ever could have gotten decent at this, but here it is.

[anamacha.livejournal.com]

good job, as always. Thanks for sharing!

[lacombe.livejournal.com]

If I quote a sentence or less of your Idol entry in my own, with credit and an embedded link to your entry, is that going to be OK with you? One of your thoughts provoked a perspective of my own.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's totally fine.

[lacombe.livejournal.com]

Thanks- I'm writing it right now. I really appreciate that.

[lacombe.livejournal.com]

You're quoted in the last paragraph. (http://lacombe.livejournal.com/168772.html) I also wrote an acknowledgment to you in the first comment. Let me know if there's anything about it you'd rather have changed.

Thanks again, RM! :-)

[twystedpixie.livejournal.com]

I never understood why people get upset when someone writes of them...if the writer has been fair-minded and done her job well, then the resulting description will be that of, simply, a human being, prone to the same demons and flaws to which we're all prone. Not a monster, nor a terrible person, but just a person. I think the problem stems from when someone is not entirely fair with herself and refuses to own up to and make peace with her flaws--it always seems that those are the people who struggle most when those same flaws are revealed in writing by someone else. I explained this terribly. Perhaps another way of saying what I want is that I've never been ashamed to pull any punches when writing of my own flaws, for I trust those reading my journal enough to love me despite them and to not judge. I often wonder why others can not do the same.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I think all this stuff is a mine field for us all.

[mme-furiosa.livejournal.com]

Brava! Very articulate response to a topic that I think we mostly take for granted here at LJ.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[n-decisive.livejournal.com]

KilljoyKilroy was here.