Sunday, September 15, 2002

Jon Udell and Ray Ozzie discuss the public/private aspects of writing the web. My first personal site from 1995 is, looking back on it, a quivering example of this issue. For many years I maintained extensive writings in a semi-private form through writing the types of things now written to blogs in email based discussion groups. I have long been an advocate of full disclosure. This was one of the issues that caused L & I problems in our marriage. I was always in favor of being honest and forthright about everything. Due to her illness she naturally had a large mess of stuff which needed to stay "closeted".

My relationship with L served as a great place for me to learn both the benefits of and problems with shading disclosure. When you cam home from school last year and told me about the boy you liked. And about how C had told him that you liked him it occurred to me that I was going to start learning these lessons again. It was very important to you that this "tale of the boy" would be between us. Since then we have discussed situations with your teachers, grandparents, friends, etc where it does make sense that disclosure be shaded in order to maintain your own personal level of safety in privacy.

So back to the public/private. Since I began writing in 2nd grade the two issues which have been my quicksilver have been personal responsibility and the nature of public vs. private views of ourselves. I have always defaulted to the believe that full disclosure is the key to both being personally responsible for your life and resolving the unresolvable in the dichotomy between the personal and the private. I am intensely private yet believe the only way to be honestly responsible is through a sacrifice of the private.

I am still trying to get an understanding of how this works. I have never admitted to anyone how much I dislike W for the crimes he committed. In revealing that I have recognized a potential murderer in myself do I implicate myself if W were to die by murder. He is dieing of cancer. I'm reasonably confident that is what will take him. But still it is not wise of me to admit that I have these feelings. If I were the investigative reporter in "Bob Roberts" and it was discovered I had revealed on a web log how much I disliked W, and someone framed me for his murder, surely I wouldn't be released from custody.

Of course you know me. I am not violent in the way we live our lives. I am always strong and support you as we go. But to be honest even if your grandparents had attempted to see you in the last 5 years I would not allow it. I do not trust them with you. And I do not trust myself with them.

I knew a man. He was a nice man. When I saw him we both genuinely liked each other. We had a certain, how shall I say, respect for each other. Our relationship was based on business. It was formal but emotionally bonded. We saw each other periodically over the span of several years. E had a large family of brothers. His dad was very abusive.

Several years after I last saw E he took the job of an assassin. More like a thug I think. Most folk consider an assassin to be some kind of international man of mystery. BUt he was hired to kill people. I don't know how many people he killed but I was told of one. The guy was another criminal who had somehow "crossed" E's client.

I don't know the details of how E killed this person. But what I was told is that he disposed of the body by renting a tree chopping machine and running over the bridge at 2am with the choppers output pointing out into the river spewing this guys body into the running water. I can't imagine E doing this. But it wouldn't surprise me either.

E was shot and killed himself. He was standing on a street corner next to a mission waiting for a handout of some kind. In the building next door on something like the 5th or 6th floor a young skinhead punk from Germany pointed a rifle at E and shot him at the base of the skull. He died instantly.

So how can this tension between the public and the private, that which we reveal to ourselves and that which we designate to reveal to others, be resolved. I don't know that it can. But whether it is my fear of your mother finding us again or my fear of your grandfather I know I have to confront these private fears in a public manner.

8:45:40 PM    comment []