Yes, I had a historical record of the fact that I might have had a post-divorce romantic past once upon a time. Yes, it was a nuanced, rich introspective and/or hysterically amusing in a ‘oh my GOD, she’s sharing THAT’ kind of way.
Today, in a fit of over-organization (that attacked the exact WRONG problem I was having on this blog, incidentally), I blew 7 years of history away. I didn’t delete the posts themselves — they’re still buried somewhere in the far distant past. But they’re just not called out in any meaningful categorical way. If I can’t find them by searching for a remembered word or phrase, well — then neither can you. And maybe that’s for the best.
Sure, some of the writing might have been pretty evocative. The post that prompted the fit to reorganize contained one little snippet — “kisses on the back of my neck” — that spawned a bittersweet trip down a long-overgrown memory lane that stays with me even now, for example. But the rest of it made me feel like I was exposed… raw… vulnerable. It made me uncomfortable. And some (if not all) of it felt indulgent when I looked back years later.
But isn’t that the way blog writing works, when done well, you ask? Doesn’t it pull on emotions, or invoke shared memories by pulling that thread that unravels, perhaps? And isn’t that part of what I advocate in my travels elsewhere online — be transparent? Authentic? Honest?
Yep. And I’m a hypocrite. Because while I value it when others are raw, honest, open, or transparent, well — I just don’t have it in me to wade back through the 500-odd posts stored in my primary category (the ironically titled ‘Boss Lady’) to restore them to their rightful place as the partial history of my love life — warts, indulgences and all.
So while I might tweet about my bourbon preferences on Twitter, for example — I’m just not up to sharing just who I might be drinking said bourbon with. Or (more likely) to whine about the fact that — as the song laments — “I drink alone…”
And you know? That’s just going to have to be okay with y’all for now…