Yesterday was kind of crappy. I woke up early, excited about being productive and excited about everything I had to do. Then I was deterred by technology problems (49 minutes of trying to open PDFs on 9 different computers). And a terrible class discussion. And a homework-filled lunch. And another class, in which I was again off and disconnected and struggling. And a seemingly unhelpful doctor's appointment. And homework. And twelve minutes to eat dinner. And a seemingly pointless class. And a three hour shift at work.
But then I started thinking about something a new friend said. She said that when people in her classes are freaking out and stressed and pessimistic, she just thinks, "Would you rather be anywhere else?"
I started thinking about that.
I wouldn't.
I love Millsaps. I love my classes, I love the readings, I love all of the things I am given the opportunity to do. I WANT to read these long, dry articles, because they are things that I'm really interested in, and if Drs. Bey and Smith and Susik weren't forcing me to, I wouldn't make the time myself. I should be thankful to these people instead of resenting them. Get your shit together, madam!
And my research papers? Really? I get to study a topic of my own choice for two different classes, pick artists that I am passionate about, and just get to read about them and look at their work for hours on end. Is there anything I'd rather be doing with my time? Why am I even asking myself this question? And the writing? Am I really complaining that I have to write? About art?
I'm now inspired enough for the day. Thanks for listening. I'm going to finish this article about Manet. And I'm going to thoroughly enjoy it.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Sunday, November 1, 2009
An email to my uncle- August 26th
I often find myself, when I am in particularly quiet or lonely states of mind, whispering, "I want to go home." It's a constant in my life, when I reach a low spot, to say these words. I say them no matter where I am, be it Covington, Millsaps College, or Tanzania. Sometimes when I am particularly happy, I say, "I don't want to go home." Again, place usually does not matter. It has to do with the people I'm with at the time. I said that in Italy, at a cafe with Miss Rich, my art history teacher who has become one of my best friends. I said that one night in Tanzania, after a great conversation with a friend. One afternoon in a local park with my now ex-boyfriend after flying a kite. After laughing for hours with Ashley or Jorda at a coffee shop.
I wish I could channel those feelings into a particular place to which I could retreat when days like today happen. Instead, on days like today, I wander. I started to take a drive to nowhere, wanting to be spontaneous and just see where the road would take me. I turned around after seven minutes. I'm too much of a perfectionist control-freak to be spontaneous. I headed to the digital arts lab and stayed there half an hour at most. I went to the library, because libraries remind me of you and they remind me of the places I can go through books, and I put my schoolwork away and read half of Translated Woman, a creative ethnography/biography Julian lent me, and it was the farthest I was able to go. I've been here for two hours now and I know that it's time to leave soon and go back to my room, where I'll brush my teeth and set my alarm and get ready for another big day tomorrow.
I'm afraid of never finding a home. I'm afraid of never feeling comfortable with people I care about, of always worrying that I'm not enough, my fear of losing them never failing to drive them away.
A friend of mine got the name and number of a therapist in Jackson because she went without weekly meetings all last year and knows it was a bad decision. I've decided to ask her for that number, but I don't know if I'll call it. All summer I said I'd go talk to someone, and I never did. I can't vividly remember a time when I was not depressed.
I talk to Jessica often and I love her very much, but I can't help but feel inadequate when we talk. Because she is living, and I'm only surviving. But I'm working on that.
---
On that note, I feel a bit more like I'm living lately. I continue to love people and things and ideas too much and I continue to expect more of myself than I can give. But I don't think I would like to live any other way. I don't want to be a Formalist. I want to be an Expressionist. Or a Postmodernist, maybe.
Also, just an interesting note, I don't know how to act at parties. Last night at the anthro club party I actually said something about the weather. Seriously, Erin? Whyyy am I so socially awkward?
My Halloween costume was damn good though. Pictures up soon?
(And a secret "I'm sorry" to someone who knows who he is)
I wish I could channel those feelings into a particular place to which I could retreat when days like today happen. Instead, on days like today, I wander. I started to take a drive to nowhere, wanting to be spontaneous and just see where the road would take me. I turned around after seven minutes. I'm too much of a perfectionist control-freak to be spontaneous. I headed to the digital arts lab and stayed there half an hour at most. I went to the library, because libraries remind me of you and they remind me of the places I can go through books, and I put my schoolwork away and read half of Translated Woman, a creative ethnography/biography Julian lent me, and it was the farthest I was able to go. I've been here for two hours now and I know that it's time to leave soon and go back to my room, where I'll brush my teeth and set my alarm and get ready for another big day tomorrow.
I'm afraid of never finding a home. I'm afraid of never feeling comfortable with people I care about, of always worrying that I'm not enough, my fear of losing them never failing to drive them away.
A friend of mine got the name and number of a therapist in Jackson because she went without weekly meetings all last year and knows it was a bad decision. I've decided to ask her for that number, but I don't know if I'll call it. All summer I said I'd go talk to someone, and I never did. I can't vividly remember a time when I was not depressed.
I talk to Jessica often and I love her very much, but I can't help but feel inadequate when we talk. Because she is living, and I'm only surviving. But I'm working on that.
---
On that note, I feel a bit more like I'm living lately. I continue to love people and things and ideas too much and I continue to expect more of myself than I can give. But I don't think I would like to live any other way. I don't want to be a Formalist. I want to be an Expressionist. Or a Postmodernist, maybe.
Also, just an interesting note, I don't know how to act at parties. Last night at the anthro club party I actually said something about the weather. Seriously, Erin? Whyyy am I so socially awkward?
My Halloween costume was damn good though. Pictures up soon?
(And a secret "I'm sorry" to someone who knows who he is)
Friday, October 30, 2009
Benjamin Rinehart and the Rebirth of the Artist- Exhibition Review
A common complaint by Formalist and many post-structuralist critics is that the artist is too present in art. With calls for the “death of the artist” and for the ability of artwork to stand on its own, these critics argue that artwork should be detached from its creator, that a personal narrative should not add to the work’s meaning. The Lewis Art Gallery’s current exhibition, open from October 23rd to December 2nd, directly contradicts these ideas. Accepted, featuring the works of Benjamin D. Rinehart, draws directly from the specific, the artist’s personal memories and experiences, to explore the universal, or the insecurity and yearning for acceptance that all people face.
Rinehart tints his prints, paintings, and books in sickeningly sweet and sometimes acidic candy colors, giving them a bittersweet, nostalgic, even humorous sensibility. Each of his works has a detailed, highly personal back-story, and though the art is capable of standing on its own, Rinehart includes a supplementary text with several pieces to enhance the viewers’ understanding. The works document seemingly formative experiences and relationships, the kind of experiences that likely made him who he is today, and I left his gallery talk feeling closer to him than I do to most of the people I see on a daily basis. Rinehart’s work prompts the question, is he revealing too much, or do we just not reveal enough?
Happy Pill of 2008 provides an excellent example of Rinehart’s use of personal experiences in his work. The small woodcut in dissonant reds and yellows features an aggressive-looking man and woman. He looms over the right side of the painting and seems to focus his anger within the picture plane, but she points her scowl and her gun at the viewer, using us as a means of release. Oversized, powdery pills are her ammunition and they also fill the Radio Flyer wagon layered carefully across the bottom of the composition.
The supplementary text poetically gives the characters a clearer identity and story: the man is his father, diagnosed with bipolar manic depression at the age of fifty-five. The woman is perhaps his mother, taking out her frustrations with her situation on those around her, or the pill-pushing doctor who, Rinehart reveals ironically, later told his father that his disease was “cured.” The viewer almost becomes Rinehart himself, simultaneously attacked and pushed away, and we get a sense of what family get-togethers and Christmas dinners might be like. Despite his straightforward and unafraid approach to the subject matter, the little red wagon reminds us that Rinehart wasn’t always a man looking back reflectively on life experiences: the thought of the little boy caught in the line of fire is almost heartbreaking.
In the most poignant aspect for myself personally, Rinehart’s work does not make himself into the victim or the characters involved into antagonists. He uses the supplementary text to explain that they had always considered his father a “wild card,” and there is a sense of affection that comes from putting experience and inherently human flaws in the right perspective. As with the rest of his works, Happy Pill shows Rinehart’s deep sensitivity and appreciation for people despite their imperfections. As the artist himself stated during his gallery talk, “Art is the best kind of therapy.” His work gives him a way of forgiving the wrongs done to him and allows him space to reflect. In essence, Rinehart is presenting bitter memories with the sweet detachment that comes with time: his reality, which inspires us to step back and see the heartbreaking, optimistic, and humorous in our own.
Although he draws from his own experiences, Rinehart’s work is not strictly personal. For those critics whose beliefs are based on Instrumentalism, the art’s responsibility to cause social changes, the artist does provide a critique of society in this work. Not only does he focus on the importance of family in the creation of self, he refers to a more controversial issue, as well. The title comments on the common reliance on medication as the solution for a multitude of problems. While his evaluation does not seem to be negative or positive, Rinehart merely calls our attention to the possible excess of diagnoses, which can color our opinions of ourselves and of those around us. His means of coping is possibly just as effective and allows him to experience the high and low moments of the life around him. Through Happy Pill, the artist provides his father and mother the same thing he finds for himself throughout the rest of the show: acceptance.
Benjamin Rinehart’s work is not the detached abstraction or valiant social commentary favored by many critics. By calling upon his own thoughts, relationships, and experiences, he doesn’t make himself weak or vulnerable, however, nor does he merely unload his problems onto the viewer. His story is one of the strength and love that are inherently human. It’s one to which all viewers can relate in some respect, and the sense that the bittersweet and inspirational story of humanity has a place in art is something I absolutely agree with. Long live the artist!
View his work here.
Rinehart tints his prints, paintings, and books in sickeningly sweet and sometimes acidic candy colors, giving them a bittersweet, nostalgic, even humorous sensibility. Each of his works has a detailed, highly personal back-story, and though the art is capable of standing on its own, Rinehart includes a supplementary text with several pieces to enhance the viewers’ understanding. The works document seemingly formative experiences and relationships, the kind of experiences that likely made him who he is today, and I left his gallery talk feeling closer to him than I do to most of the people I see on a daily basis. Rinehart’s work prompts the question, is he revealing too much, or do we just not reveal enough?
Happy Pill of 2008 provides an excellent example of Rinehart’s use of personal experiences in his work. The small woodcut in dissonant reds and yellows features an aggressive-looking man and woman. He looms over the right side of the painting and seems to focus his anger within the picture plane, but she points her scowl and her gun at the viewer, using us as a means of release. Oversized, powdery pills are her ammunition and they also fill the Radio Flyer wagon layered carefully across the bottom of the composition.
The supplementary text poetically gives the characters a clearer identity and story: the man is his father, diagnosed with bipolar manic depression at the age of fifty-five. The woman is perhaps his mother, taking out her frustrations with her situation on those around her, or the pill-pushing doctor who, Rinehart reveals ironically, later told his father that his disease was “cured.” The viewer almost becomes Rinehart himself, simultaneously attacked and pushed away, and we get a sense of what family get-togethers and Christmas dinners might be like. Despite his straightforward and unafraid approach to the subject matter, the little red wagon reminds us that Rinehart wasn’t always a man looking back reflectively on life experiences: the thought of the little boy caught in the line of fire is almost heartbreaking.
In the most poignant aspect for myself personally, Rinehart’s work does not make himself into the victim or the characters involved into antagonists. He uses the supplementary text to explain that they had always considered his father a “wild card,” and there is a sense of affection that comes from putting experience and inherently human flaws in the right perspective. As with the rest of his works, Happy Pill shows Rinehart’s deep sensitivity and appreciation for people despite their imperfections. As the artist himself stated during his gallery talk, “Art is the best kind of therapy.” His work gives him a way of forgiving the wrongs done to him and allows him space to reflect. In essence, Rinehart is presenting bitter memories with the sweet detachment that comes with time: his reality, which inspires us to step back and see the heartbreaking, optimistic, and humorous in our own.
Although he draws from his own experiences, Rinehart’s work is not strictly personal. For those critics whose beliefs are based on Instrumentalism, the art’s responsibility to cause social changes, the artist does provide a critique of society in this work. Not only does he focus on the importance of family in the creation of self, he refers to a more controversial issue, as well. The title comments on the common reliance on medication as the solution for a multitude of problems. While his evaluation does not seem to be negative or positive, Rinehart merely calls our attention to the possible excess of diagnoses, which can color our opinions of ourselves and of those around us. His means of coping is possibly just as effective and allows him to experience the high and low moments of the life around him. Through Happy Pill, the artist provides his father and mother the same thing he finds for himself throughout the rest of the show: acceptance.
Benjamin Rinehart’s work is not the detached abstraction or valiant social commentary favored by many critics. By calling upon his own thoughts, relationships, and experiences, he doesn’t make himself weak or vulnerable, however, nor does he merely unload his problems onto the viewer. His story is one of the strength and love that are inherently human. It’s one to which all viewers can relate in some respect, and the sense that the bittersweet and inspirational story of humanity has a place in art is something I absolutely agree with. Long live the artist!
View his work here.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
My Fear of Drunkenness (written on post-it notes a long time ago)
The other night, I witnessed one of the saddest things I have ever seen. I was in the lobby of my dorm, editing a paper. It was a Thursday, the first night of the weekend for most, and the music from the nearby fraternity houses kept my study space from being that awkward "too quiet." Around 1:45 am, a man stumbled crookedly across the room toward the halls. He was heavy-set and heavy-lidded, tall, with this beautiful curly hair pushed back and falling slightly below his chin. He was silent.
He looked like he was walking against a friend, like kids do, leaning one way, then another, like he was pushing against someone, sometimes winning that little game and sometimes losing. Does that make any sense?
He looked like a car swerving on the road when the driver changes the cd and loses control for only milliseconds, then recovers.
Drunk.
But that wasn't what was sad to me. What I found so heartbreaking was that he was so clumsy, so vulnerable, and so utterly alone. It defined why I don't drink.
I don't trust you. I don't trust anyone not to leave me alone, not to abandon me to stumble alone, not to let me get out of hand when my inhibitions are gone. I've heard often enough in the cafeteria, "Did you hear what so-and-so did last night?" "Last night so-and-so was drrrunk." I only really trust myself to defend myself and keep myself in line. That's why I don't drink.
That's also why I've said, many times, that I wish I could drink. Maybe one day.
He looked like he was walking against a friend, like kids do, leaning one way, then another, like he was pushing against someone, sometimes winning that little game and sometimes losing. Does that make any sense?
He looked like a car swerving on the road when the driver changes the cd and loses control for only milliseconds, then recovers.
Drunk.
But that wasn't what was sad to me. What I found so heartbreaking was that he was so clumsy, so vulnerable, and so utterly alone. It defined why I don't drink.
I don't trust you. I don't trust anyone not to leave me alone, not to abandon me to stumble alone, not to let me get out of hand when my inhibitions are gone. I've heard often enough in the cafeteria, "Did you hear what so-and-so did last night?" "Last night so-and-so was drrrunk." I only really trust myself to defend myself and keep myself in line. That's why I don't drink.
That's also why I've said, many times, that I wish I could drink. Maybe one day.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Creating Meaning or Creating Fiction
This is something I've been wanting to write for a while and just haven't gotten around to it. After a rather rough day yesterday, I thought maybe it was time to make time.
How to begin? This is where I always get caught with this post. How does one preface a theory that may not apply to anyone else? How does one express an idea that seems so obvious yet so unclear? Why am I referring to myself as "one"? These are my ideas, aren't they? I think they are universal, but maybe I should focus on the specific before the general. Or maybe I should start on distant ideas before bringing them close to home.
In novels, there are often symbolic elements that stand for things going on in the story. As an example, in Wuthering Heights, a symbolic tree is struck by symbolic lightning and symbolically split in half at a key point in the story when the protagonists are torn apart. It just happens. The characters don't notice it, but we do. We're supposed to connect this natural phenomenon to the emotional and psychological states of the characters. Somehow it gives these states more meaning. I learned about a fallacy in AP Composition that reminded me slightly of this: the sun shining when the main character is happy, the bottom dropping out of the sky when she is feeling especially sad or upset or overwhelmed. A grey sky when she's depressed.
In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce shows us Stephen Dedalus creating these symbols for himself. He witnesses things in his everyday life and gives them symbolic, even mythic, meaning. A snippet of conversation, a woman standing with her back turned and waves crashing at her feet, the repetition of objects or sounds or reactions. Dedalus takes these things and makes them more than memories, makes them awe-inspiring, life-changing. He lets these things call upon earlier experiences and foreshadow later ones.
It's beautiful, but the beauty is a human construction. What if a bully's joke is only a joke, to be ignored and forgotten? What if the girl on the shore is only the cause for momentary admiration, a half-second of yearning for contentment? Dedalus's power comes from his sensitivity, sensitivity that makes his highs higher and his lows lower. By ascribing meaning to nearly everything, he makes his life meaningful, something that all or most of us aim for. Does the fact that it is his own construction make it less meaningful? Is he creating meaning or fiction?
We have two crape myrtles on my front lawn, directly in front of the house, on the soil we added when we leveled the land, right before the land takes its own shape. Crape myrtles are my mother's favorite because they flower in various colors and the tiny petals just look soft and Southern. Dad bought her two for an anniversary five or maybe seven years ago, and he found what he thought would be the best place for them: plenty of sun, rockless ground, right where we can see them everyday.
It has been five, maybe seven, years, and they still have not yet bloomed. In the tradition of Bronte and Joyce, I want to ascribe meaning to this. What does it say about my parents' marriage? About our family dynamic? All of effort that seems pointless in the end?
Sometimes I create situations in my head in which these trees flower. I think, if this was a book, and these crape myrtles turned from green to pink in the summertime, what would that mean? Sometimes it is because my father leaves. Or my sister actually cries. Or terrible secrets are finally spoken. Or we all sit down and actually talk and actually tell the truth.
The trees bloom. Sad smiles. Acceptance. Contentment. New life.
How Joycean. My own fallacious construct. The search for meaning that affects everything.
My extended family might be falling apart at the seams. My aunts are at odds, as they've always been, but this time it's worse and this time I can't see a possible solution and this time it might be the end. I keep looking for meaning around me, for snippets of conversations to which I can relate, to dented car doors, to dying vegetation. Something that will make this emotional, psychological state into something physical and material and concrete that I can see.
I'm not going to find it. And if I do, it won't be real. That's the thing. It will be my fiction.
It scares me that I don't know what we're losing. It scares me that we give meaning to things that are meaningless, that we drive people away for reasons we don't understand, that we hurt the people closest to us, or people at all.
Can love exist without hatred? Can we exist without being at odds? Will our crape myrtles ever bloom?
How to begin? This is where I always get caught with this post. How does one preface a theory that may not apply to anyone else? How does one express an idea that seems so obvious yet so unclear? Why am I referring to myself as "one"? These are my ideas, aren't they? I think they are universal, but maybe I should focus on the specific before the general. Or maybe I should start on distant ideas before bringing them close to home.
In novels, there are often symbolic elements that stand for things going on in the story. As an example, in Wuthering Heights, a symbolic tree is struck by symbolic lightning and symbolically split in half at a key point in the story when the protagonists are torn apart. It just happens. The characters don't notice it, but we do. We're supposed to connect this natural phenomenon to the emotional and psychological states of the characters. Somehow it gives these states more meaning. I learned about a fallacy in AP Composition that reminded me slightly of this: the sun shining when the main character is happy, the bottom dropping out of the sky when she is feeling especially sad or upset or overwhelmed. A grey sky when she's depressed.
In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce shows us Stephen Dedalus creating these symbols for himself. He witnesses things in his everyday life and gives them symbolic, even mythic, meaning. A snippet of conversation, a woman standing with her back turned and waves crashing at her feet, the repetition of objects or sounds or reactions. Dedalus takes these things and makes them more than memories, makes them awe-inspiring, life-changing. He lets these things call upon earlier experiences and foreshadow later ones.
It's beautiful, but the beauty is a human construction. What if a bully's joke is only a joke, to be ignored and forgotten? What if the girl on the shore is only the cause for momentary admiration, a half-second of yearning for contentment? Dedalus's power comes from his sensitivity, sensitivity that makes his highs higher and his lows lower. By ascribing meaning to nearly everything, he makes his life meaningful, something that all or most of us aim for. Does the fact that it is his own construction make it less meaningful? Is he creating meaning or fiction?
We have two crape myrtles on my front lawn, directly in front of the house, on the soil we added when we leveled the land, right before the land takes its own shape. Crape myrtles are my mother's favorite because they flower in various colors and the tiny petals just look soft and Southern. Dad bought her two for an anniversary five or maybe seven years ago, and he found what he thought would be the best place for them: plenty of sun, rockless ground, right where we can see them everyday.
It has been five, maybe seven, years, and they still have not yet bloomed. In the tradition of Bronte and Joyce, I want to ascribe meaning to this. What does it say about my parents' marriage? About our family dynamic? All of effort that seems pointless in the end?
Sometimes I create situations in my head in which these trees flower. I think, if this was a book, and these crape myrtles turned from green to pink in the summertime, what would that mean? Sometimes it is because my father leaves. Or my sister actually cries. Or terrible secrets are finally spoken. Or we all sit down and actually talk and actually tell the truth.
The trees bloom. Sad smiles. Acceptance. Contentment. New life.
How Joycean. My own fallacious construct. The search for meaning that affects everything.
My extended family might be falling apart at the seams. My aunts are at odds, as they've always been, but this time it's worse and this time I can't see a possible solution and this time it might be the end. I keep looking for meaning around me, for snippets of conversations to which I can relate, to dented car doors, to dying vegetation. Something that will make this emotional, psychological state into something physical and material and concrete that I can see.
I'm not going to find it. And if I do, it won't be real. That's the thing. It will be my fiction.
It scares me that I don't know what we're losing. It scares me that we give meaning to things that are meaningless, that we drive people away for reasons we don't understand, that we hurt the people closest to us, or people at all.
Can love exist without hatred? Can we exist without being at odds? Will our crape myrtles ever bloom?
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Fragmented
A couple of people have commented lately on the recent quality of this blog. As Jessica put it, it's been very "fragmented."
I have a couple of theories about why this might be. First, I've just been pretty scattered lately. I have a lot to do. A lot has been going on. My mind is always going in a million directions and I haven't had time lately when I could just sit back, relax, and reflect. And the time that I have had like that, I haven't been near a computer. I'm not upset about this. I like that I've been busier living life than I have been writing about life. And yet, looking back on my last couple of entries is unsatisfying.
Another theory: there are things going on right now that I can't exactly blog about yet. Losing friends, gaining friends, first dates-- things that certain people will understand and certain people will not, things that I can't "say out loud" because I don't know who exactly is reading and I can't type them until I address them with the people involved. So I allude to them. Unsatisfying. Such is the problem with blogging about my own life.
I've also started to question the point of this blog. I use it the way I would use a journal, but I have to censor myself. Why not just keep a journal? Two reasons, I guess. First, having readers keeps me accountable. I can't stop writing for too long, or people are going to call me on it. If the quality decreases, people are going to call me on it. I need that.
And second, selfishly, I like to know that someone is listening. I like to know that my thoughts matter to someone, enough to read them and relate to them. Having a certain number of readers a day gives me this foolish validation of my worth.
The first reason is a good one for keeping up with the blog. The second one is terrible, and it's something I need to get over. So I'm going to compromise, I think. I'm going to keep blogging, but I'm going to stop blogging about myself.
So I'm stressed about an exam or a paper? Who cares? You don't. I won't, looking back on it in a couple of weeks or a couple of months. I want to write more about moments and ideas and experiences. Many of these will be mine, or they will include my reflection. But that's different.
I think that's different.
I have a couple of theories about why this might be. First, I've just been pretty scattered lately. I have a lot to do. A lot has been going on. My mind is always going in a million directions and I haven't had time lately when I could just sit back, relax, and reflect. And the time that I have had like that, I haven't been near a computer. I'm not upset about this. I like that I've been busier living life than I have been writing about life. And yet, looking back on my last couple of entries is unsatisfying.
Another theory: there are things going on right now that I can't exactly blog about yet. Losing friends, gaining friends, first dates-- things that certain people will understand and certain people will not, things that I can't "say out loud" because I don't know who exactly is reading and I can't type them until I address them with the people involved. So I allude to them. Unsatisfying. Such is the problem with blogging about my own life.
I've also started to question the point of this blog. I use it the way I would use a journal, but I have to censor myself. Why not just keep a journal? Two reasons, I guess. First, having readers keeps me accountable. I can't stop writing for too long, or people are going to call me on it. If the quality decreases, people are going to call me on it. I need that.
And second, selfishly, I like to know that someone is listening. I like to know that my thoughts matter to someone, enough to read them and relate to them. Having a certain number of readers a day gives me this foolish validation of my worth.
The first reason is a good one for keeping up with the blog. The second one is terrible, and it's something I need to get over. So I'm going to compromise, I think. I'm going to keep blogging, but I'm going to stop blogging about myself.
So I'm stressed about an exam or a paper? Who cares? You don't. I won't, looking back on it in a couple of weeks or a couple of months. I want to write more about moments and ideas and experiences. Many of these will be mine, or they will include my reflection. But that's different.
I think that's different.
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