A Clarification

I take back some of what I said yesterday about witty ironic slogans and so on. I’ve realized that some of the blogs I enjoy actually have them. I do, in fact, find it interesting intellectually that slogans are so popular in blogs, because it’s evidence of television’s influence on our culture and on the ways we express ourselves linguistically and artistically. But I think I was just using that idea as a vehicle for expressing some personal envy about some particular sites. I kind of wish I could take back that entire entry, in fact, as well as a couple of e-mails I wrote yesterday, because now I feel like I was being a great big one-man pity party. Thanks for all the comments, though — I appreciate them. I guess I was feeling emotionally needy and I needed that kind of validation.

These last few days my self-esteem has felt a bit more fragile than usual. I don’t know why. But I’ve been in this funk, and the two may or may not be related. I’m worried I might not have a job next month, and I’m going to have to send out some resumés, just to be safe, which requires more effort than I’d care to put into the matter. And I haven’t been able to concentrate on my work again. For about three weeks after I came back from West Virginia, I was being so productive, but sometime last week I stopped again. And I can’t seem to stay out of Internet chat rooms late at night, due to a combination of arousal and boredom, and that shames and troubles me. Most of the time I don’t wind up meeting anyone, either because they’re not interested in me or because I’m not interested in them (I do have standards, after all), but I’m still troubled that I can’t seem to tear myself away. Sometimes it feels like an addiction.

But lest you think that’s all I do at night, my social life is improving lately, thanks to both the blogging world and Twentysomething. Last night I went to a Twentysomething group dinner, and on Saturday there’s a group trip to Fire Island. I’ve never been there, so I might go. And tonight I’m doing a little theatergoing with Mike, whom I haven’t seen in about four months.

The whole idea of writing about one’s personal life on the Internet is pretty absurd if you think about it (and you probably shouldn’t think about it). Everything is amplified. When you’re happy, you can share your joy with the world. But when you’re not happy, you can come off sounding pitiful and/or pathetic. What’s even worse is when you come off sounding resentful and envious, like I did yesterday, because it might piss some people off. But what I wrote yesterday really wasn’t about other people. I was feeling a little crapped out about myself. And that’s what envy’s all about, really; it’s not about other people. It’s about yourself.