Don't let the Facebook bot catch you crying...

Of all the things in life that make me upset, making someone upset upsets me the most. I really hate hurting people. Always have. This probably comes from my hyper-empathetic nature. For a long time, I saw this as a sort of weakness. You couldn't be strong if you were always feeling the pain of others. So I developed some calluses that kept that at bay. Of course, I took it too far in that direction and became a bit of a bastard back in the early 90's. It fit with the times, though. I was a Neo-Con, and we were encouraged to look down upon people in order to keep the ideology afloat. Anyways, the calluses are pretty well gone now, and while I can still reach back and find my inner bastard when needed (and it is still needed at times; ever try and get an overdraft charge reversed with US Bank?) I typically don't use that power much anymore.

But my therapist has been encouraging me to express things inside me that hurt, especially when (I feel like) I've been hurt by someone elses' actions. Apparently, I have developed a bit of a tendency to keep quiet when hurt in order to preserve peace and stability. Now, to me, this is a useful thing. I spent a lot of my time in the past "venting", and never really got much out of it, so I didn't really see a point to it, and just sort-of stopped doing it. I didn't feel "bottled up", so I thought what I was doing, or how I was or wasn't doing things, was fine. But apparently this lack of self-expression started acting like a big moldy wet blanket these past years, and has really allowed some nasty garbage to grow in the stagnant air trapped under it.

Enter the blog.

Now it's not that I'm new to blogging. I helped build these here tubes back when they were run by compressed air and steam, and had a personal web thingy as far back as 1993. Before that, I was an avid BBS'er well back into the 80's (and before trolls start snarking; I have actually used both FidoNet, and ARPANET on a 300BPS modem, so shut it). Anyhow, I have a long and chequered history when it comes to leaving footprints in the digital sand. There is some truly dumb stuff floating around in the web of time that has my name on it, but it is typically about me alone. I've never been much on airing laundry that isn't mine.

The blogsphere offers an interesting platform. Being as wired as I am, and having folks that follow my writings and ramblings, one would think it only logical for me to blog. However, I actually resisted for many, many years. I just didn't think that me saying anything out-loud would be of any benefit to anyone. I did keep an active blog over at Suicidegirls.com for a number of years, though; mostly as an adjunct to my piloting and managing a number of SIG's there. That's really where my blognique was honed. Once I decided that my time with non-3D tattoo'd nekkidness was at an end, I realized--mostly from my readers there saying "Where can I read your blog?"--that I did, in fact, need one. So I hammered this thing out. It languished for a few months.

Last fall, at the beginning of the biggest changes my life has know in the past twenty-five years, my therapist suggested (encouraged, cajoled) that I actually use it as a tool for getting my feelings out. Yeah, crazy, but she's a smart cookie, and I knew that she was right about the bottling-up thing. So I slowly started posting more personal tid-bits. It did feel helpful to not let so many feelings go unexpressed. More recently, it has become a bit of a Zen sandbox where I can work on formulating ideas and hashing out certain understandings. Very helpful. As my connection with my sangha grew, many of us started up Facebook pages, and have enjoyed getting a glimpse into each-other's lives while off the cushion. So I thought it pretty neat that Facebook had an app/widget thingy that took your blog posts and posted them on my Facebook page. Cool. No more heavy lifting cut-and-pasting. Thank gawd; that was sooooo 2007.

This past week has been emotionally raw one for me. The divorce is proceeding (which is a good thing, don't get me wrong) but with it comes feelings of fear, concern and sadness. Now understand me; it's these times that I'm most likely to hole-up and go quiet, making my depression and inner-pain even worse than it actually is. So, time to write about it. Time to let it out, thought I. But even in that writing, I was careful to make sure I wasn't just venting my spleen. I took pains to elucidate how I feel, but not to stretch it out into unrealistic proportions. If anything, I was going for pathos, not pity. I didn't pull any punches, but I did temper my hurt with what I thought was the over-arching truth of the situation. I was hurting inside, and needed to let it out. And since the person I used to let it out to was a subject, the blog seemed to be the best mechanism for doing so constructively.

However, I failed to remember the fabulous Facebook gnome that would check my blog twice a day and repost it for all to see. In that blog entry, there were some specifics mentioned that--while completely factual--were really better left off the morning's front page, especially without context of any kind. So for this blog entry to suddenly "go live"--with no filter or context of any kind, no matter how "true", "accurate" or "honest" its content may be--could be rather upsetting and very easily hurtful to someone I care very deeply about, no matter the practical circumstance.

So, to wrap this rambling thing up, I'd like to say this:

To my favorite person on earth:

I am sorry I screwed up.
I am sorry I hurt your feelings.
I am sorry if I embarrassed you.
I still love you enough to get divorced.
Zonker puked in your closet.
I cleaned it up already.

Love,

-me