crankyoldman (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
crankyoldman) wrote2008-10-02 01:19 am
crankyoldman) wrote2008-10-02 01:19 am
Networks, and How My Life Is Getting Blurred
Alright, can't sleep, and it's not like I have class tomorrow anyway. Not awake enough to do homework, so I figured I'd get some of the spinning ideas out of my head.
More and more it's becoming apparent that how I compartmentalize my life is getting thwarted. Online friends are calling me by my real name, people in real life read my livejournal, and my boss messages me on Facebook. I'll admit to some panic when I realized this was happening, because I think I've finally owned up to the fact I am a bit of a control freak. Not over people, though, but over the minutiae of my daily life, and how I process information. Because even when I'm slacking off, or my schedules are a mess and my room's a mess, I will make the time to stop and put it back where it needs to be once I'm in control of my time again.
So I've realized I just need to keep things in their piles again, on the internet at least. And I recently added a new blog to my feeds, and it popped up with this fun little article and it got me to thinking.
I think I do a decent job of keeping the personal as personal and professional as professional. It's one of my biggest fears that they should mix--not because I'm gay, actually, but more because I have always been a vigorous guardian of the personal/professional divide. I won't hide anything if confronted, and yeah, I'll walk into work in a costume if I know it's ok in a workplace (because hey, it's not always the case), but that still isn't toeing the line too much. Small companies have a certain degree of overlap, but I know in my company in particular it has to do with the fact most of the starter employees were all friends to begin with. I work with the kind of people that are willing to not get paid for a month and work overtime to keep the company going. It is personal to them, to some extent.
And really, work isn't my problem. Sure, my boss messages me on Facebook, but she's just trying to get ahold of me, and hey, it's a bit of a girl thing. I don't have anyone else friended there, though I would probably friend them back if they requested. But they haven't. And I'm really cool with that.
No, what has been gnawing at me lately are old friends, and those annoying high school busybodies. Separate groups that present separate things. I can deal with the latter better; just block them off from everything. But I have become more open lately (note the un-locked LJ, for starters), so even that may stop working. And old friends, well, I did disappear for several years, basically. I'd like to blame the ex for that, but it was by choice--it's very hard to start your own life in the same reference frame, I suppose. And back then, it was easy because hey, no contact. Shit, there was even a HUGE rumor I'd joined the CIA, because I managed to vanish so well.
But now, now that my stuff's together, I know that I should be maintaining my networks. Only the neat little boxes I put them in are getting mixed up. Part of it was laziness--I do like to write something every day, even if it's just "Aeromechanics is Cock"--and part of it was there has to be some centralization to socializing. Only reason I managed so many different social groups back in the day was because they were the same geographical local, and had schedules. Now? Schedules break down. I know like, two people in my actual geographical local I'd call friends. I'm not lonely, I'm just a control freak. I need to control the flow of data in my life. I need to roll my eyes at Ashley's next inane Big Cause (none of you know her, ha, and it's a pseudonym) and look at how everyone's spawning now (they are, and instead of being sad, I'm actually rather amused, this is FUN being the nonspawning type) and even read the titles of what is likely horrificness on![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
ff_press and occasionally brave a link once in a while.
The problem comes down to the fact that Cendri can say whatever she's thinking and feeling, but Liz still tends towards self-censorship.
I am not one of those people that are confused between my alias online and myself; I have always been me online. How I type is how I talk, any pictures you see of me are only staged inasmuch as taking a picture of yourself requires (unless cameras come to life and they can take candid shots of me). In fact, for a while I was more myself online than in real life. Not the case as much anymore, which I suppose is the crux of it. I have nothing left to hide, and yet. And yet.
It's the little things. Offhanded comments from one group or the other. I suppose that is always the problem of having a moderate (yet still firm) position on most things; you get to hear all the things that people say about each other out of ignorance or having differences. Like trying to explain to my mother that just because I write about the gay sometimes doesn't mean it's porn. Or trying to say delicately to an artist friend of mine that I'm not giving up my passions by being in a program aimed at a "real job", and that our struggles are ultimately the same.
No matter how many widgets I put on my igoogle page so that I can keep my Facebook, Twitter, LJ, and email in balance, there is still some part of me that someone will dislike and that I feel like minimizing in order that things keep out of conflict. I'll say something when pushed, but I don't push first, I suppose.
Also, I remember my first con, and how my friends there calling me 'Cendri' fit, and how at this last one everyone called me 'Liz' and it felt kind of... wrong. I mean, using a nickname instead of a fullname was like a rite of passage; up until puberty I insisted on 'Elizabeth' to the point of kicking people that tried any nicknames. Now I only use it to sign things and distance myself from people I don't care to know personally. But Cendri's a nickname too, from a username that was a bit more, well, pretentious. And it kind of feels more unique without being twee, because lord knows there are a crap ton of women with my name.
Ha, I'd originally intended to use this as a way to show off how centralized and mobile my shit is, and it turns into a discussion on identity. This is what happens when I write late. It gets away from me.
I suppose it's ironic that while I don't fit boxes well, I insist on keeping everything else in them. Hrm.
~Cendri
P.S. Dexter season 2... OMG HARRY YOU WHORE!
...Is it wrong that this statement means I like him more? Seriously.
More and more it's becoming apparent that how I compartmentalize my life is getting thwarted. Online friends are calling me by my real name, people in real life read my livejournal, and my boss messages me on Facebook. I'll admit to some panic when I realized this was happening, because I think I've finally owned up to the fact I am a bit of a control freak. Not over people, though, but over the minutiae of my daily life, and how I process information. Because even when I'm slacking off, or my schedules are a mess and my room's a mess, I will make the time to stop and put it back where it needs to be once I'm in control of my time again.
So I've realized I just need to keep things in their piles again, on the internet at least. And I recently added a new blog to my feeds, and it popped up with this fun little article and it got me to thinking.
I think I do a decent job of keeping the personal as personal and professional as professional. It's one of my biggest fears that they should mix--not because I'm gay, actually, but more because I have always been a vigorous guardian of the personal/professional divide. I won't hide anything if confronted, and yeah, I'll walk into work in a costume if I know it's ok in a workplace (because hey, it's not always the case), but that still isn't toeing the line too much. Small companies have a certain degree of overlap, but I know in my company in particular it has to do with the fact most of the starter employees were all friends to begin with. I work with the kind of people that are willing to not get paid for a month and work overtime to keep the company going. It is personal to them, to some extent.
And really, work isn't my problem. Sure, my boss messages me on Facebook, but she's just trying to get ahold of me, and hey, it's a bit of a girl thing. I don't have anyone else friended there, though I would probably friend them back if they requested. But they haven't. And I'm really cool with that.
No, what has been gnawing at me lately are old friends, and those annoying high school busybodies. Separate groups that present separate things. I can deal with the latter better; just block them off from everything. But I have become more open lately (note the un-locked LJ, for starters), so even that may stop working. And old friends, well, I did disappear for several years, basically. I'd like to blame the ex for that, but it was by choice--it's very hard to start your own life in the same reference frame, I suppose. And back then, it was easy because hey, no contact. Shit, there was even a HUGE rumor I'd joined the CIA, because I managed to vanish so well.
But now, now that my stuff's together, I know that I should be maintaining my networks. Only the neat little boxes I put them in are getting mixed up. Part of it was laziness--I do like to write something every day, even if it's just "Aeromechanics is Cock"--and part of it was there has to be some centralization to socializing. Only reason I managed so many different social groups back in the day was because they were the same geographical local, and had schedules. Now? Schedules break down. I know like, two people in my actual geographical local I'd call friends. I'm not lonely, I'm just a control freak. I need to control the flow of data in my life. I need to roll my eyes at Ashley's next inane Big Cause (none of you know her, ha, and it's a pseudonym) and look at how everyone's spawning now (they are, and instead of being sad, I'm actually rather amused, this is FUN being the nonspawning type) and even read the titles of what is likely horrificness on
ff_press and occasionally brave a link once in a while. The problem comes down to the fact that Cendri can say whatever she's thinking and feeling, but Liz still tends towards self-censorship.
I am not one of those people that are confused between my alias online and myself; I have always been me online. How I type is how I talk, any pictures you see of me are only staged inasmuch as taking a picture of yourself requires (unless cameras come to life and they can take candid shots of me). In fact, for a while I was more myself online than in real life. Not the case as much anymore, which I suppose is the crux of it. I have nothing left to hide, and yet. And yet.
It's the little things. Offhanded comments from one group or the other. I suppose that is always the problem of having a moderate (yet still firm) position on most things; you get to hear all the things that people say about each other out of ignorance or having differences. Like trying to explain to my mother that just because I write about the gay sometimes doesn't mean it's porn. Or trying to say delicately to an artist friend of mine that I'm not giving up my passions by being in a program aimed at a "real job", and that our struggles are ultimately the same.
No matter how many widgets I put on my igoogle page so that I can keep my Facebook, Twitter, LJ, and email in balance, there is still some part of me that someone will dislike and that I feel like minimizing in order that things keep out of conflict. I'll say something when pushed, but I don't push first, I suppose.
Also, I remember my first con, and how my friends there calling me 'Cendri' fit, and how at this last one everyone called me 'Liz' and it felt kind of... wrong. I mean, using a nickname instead of a fullname was like a rite of passage; up until puberty I insisted on 'Elizabeth' to the point of kicking people that tried any nicknames. Now I only use it to sign things and distance myself from people I don't care to know personally. But Cendri's a nickname too, from a username that was a bit more, well, pretentious. And it kind of feels more unique without being twee, because lord knows there are a crap ton of women with my name.
Ha, I'd originally intended to use this as a way to show off how centralized and mobile my shit is, and it turns into a discussion on identity. This is what happens when I write late. It gets away from me.
I suppose it's ironic that while I don't fit boxes well, I insist on keeping everything else in them. Hrm.
~Cendri
P.S. Dexter season 2... OMG HARRY YOU WHORE!
...Is it wrong that this statement means I like him more? Seriously.
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