• queenparanoia said on Apr 12, 2008....

  maybe you should spend more time here and read more blogs if you want to have a connection with people here...

• evil_twin said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I remember awhile back (when you were still using your other screen name) you were sharing stories of how you met your fiance. I really enjoyed those, because they did give a glimpse into your life and your real life love story. And I liked reading about your dog Buddy too. I think that when you give people insight into what you're all about, it helps them connect to you. It's the only way to know if you have anything in common with someone.
  
  And some people are just easier to connect to than others. But it does take a little effort to form relationships with people here. I do try and read and comment to your blogs when you put them up. I know lots of people join in when you post something controversial here at SC, but I tend to shy away from that stuff. I don't like conflicts. I like reading about people's lives instead.
  
  You made a comment to me not too long ago that was really nice and helpful and showed me that you could relate to me and what I was going through. I appreciated that. So if you did spend more time commenting to others, and sharing more of yourself, I think you'd find that people would connect to you a lot more.
  
  But I guess if you don't have time to do that, or don't feel comfortable doing it, then there probably isn't a lot that can be done to leave your mark on this place :-( But I'm still here reading....
  
  -evil_twin LA
  
  
  
  
  

• lfbno7 said on Apr 12, 2008....

  shut up, stupid.
  
  only playing, don't hit me. just trying to make you smile. maybe that's not the right way, huh? i have a very odd sense of humor.

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Queen ~ I know.  And you are one of my favorite people here :-)  I used to spend a lot of time here and talk to so many people but never felt that I fit in.  Then I kinda faded away. 
   
  Kyle ~ Very few of my blogs don't have a comment from you :-)  I think I'm just kinda blah today and feeling a bit down.  I think I just need to flush all the negative feelings I've been having about SC and start over with a new attitude.  Wish me luck lol. 
   
  Ifbno7 ~  LMAO  Thanks, you did make me smile and kinda snap out of it.  Odd is good BTW.

• pickersplock said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Just write what you feel like writing, Joy!
  Don't even worry about the comments or the veiws.
  Some of the dumbest stuff I've ever written, seems to have gone off the charts with the comments, and some of the best...........nothing!
  Go figure!
   

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Thanks Pickers :-)  I usually don't worry about how many people read or comment but sometimes I feel a little silly if it seems like I'm just talking to myself.  Which I do when I'm not at the computer anyway lol.

• pickersplock said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I do that too. 
  I'm practicing to be an elderly eccentric!  :)

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I just wanna be the crazy cat lady down the street lol

• Zayda said on Apr 12, 2008....

  There's nothing wrong with being the crazy cat lady down the street. I could be the crazy cat lady with you. :)
  
  
  Joy, just keep writing what you feel like writing. That's what's important.
  
  
  And, I don't think you should believe that we wouldn't notice if you "faded away". We would.

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Zayda ~ There's plenty of room on the porch for us to both be crazy cat ladies lol.  Thank you :-)

• quietone said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Okay, we are all going to go to the porch and be cat ladies!  we will sip our lemonade and talk all day rocking in our rockers... ahh, a nice lazy day... pay no mind Joy, keep writing what ever, or even if you don't I love having you visit my posts... I don't write that often either.  I would miss you if you "faded away".

• Mr_Box said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I haven't really had the opportunity yet to get to know you. I know what you mean about not having the time to really form close relationships with people here though.
  
  
  I'm not here often enough to do that with very many people either. Although there are a few people who I instantly clicked with and spend more time talking to them privately than I do blogging. 
  
  
  I suppose I just think of it as I might not have as many friends here as some people have. But the ones I do have, are good ones. You might find that too.
  
  
  And I think judging by your comments, people would notice if you faded away. So don't do that ;-)
  
  
  
  

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Quiet ~ That sounds wonderful!  Thanks :-)
   
  Mr. Box ~ I think you are very right, Thank you

• Expendable said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I'm lucky to get any comments on my post, they're so boring. You're getting the views, you're not doing so bad.

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Expendable ~ I doubt you're boring ;-)  Thank you.

• rupert7 said on Apr 12, 2008....

  
  Joy...... thats the way is goes here! lol. some people write something....well meaningless, and yet 500 people read it and maybe 250 leave a comment. Someone else writes something that is sensible,and important,at least to them. What happens? they get 2 people read it and ZERO comments! Just write for yourself! And comment on other blogs all the time! It will turn around! You may never get as much response as some do....even with drivel they sometimes write! People want to have fun,you see! You want heavy stuff?.....read a news paper. I do know how you w]feel...makes you feel a bit like this! No offense intended here (smile)
  
  
  

• Twylarants said on Apr 12, 2008....

  Wait a minute here! How is anyone going to know what I'm talking about if you're not around to translate for me?

• Actorguy said on Apr 12, 2008....

  I think this is the first post of yours that I have read, so you can't leave now!  Talk about anything you like, it doesn't have to be profound.

• MissMimi said on Apr 13, 2008....

  Joy, it makes me feel bad that you feel you've made so little an impression.  :(

  Can I join the crazy cat lady circle?  If age and crotchetyness is required, then I'm good to go!

  It's been said before but, write whatever the heck you want.  Fill up the page with nonsense!  Whatever you choose to write, do it because you want to.  Be genuinely you.

  And come and visit my blog when ever you want.  I'm about as un-profound as they come!

• lfbno7 said on Apr 13, 2008....

  I'm really deep. I'm about 23 feet deep. Awfully profound.

• MekhongKurt said on Apr 13, 2008....

  JoyousLoving --

  I had the rather irksome experience of spending over an hour writing a comment here this morning, only to have my Internet connection here in Thailand crash.  And that comment was lost, but your situation made enough of an impact I decided to write a summary of what I wrote before.

  First, I taught writing for the equal to about 27 years on the university level, have been an editor, and am currently a writer (in the form of a weekly column for my own website).  So, the difficulties confronting folks writing in whatever forum aren't new to me.

  Now to the thoughts I had.  Let me take a blunt approach: don't be silly.  Everyone has an interesting something to tell.

  The short version of the main comment I made is I know an almost entirely uneducated guy a local in the area of my homeplace in Texas, a small ranch immediately outside a small ranching and farming community who is almost entirely uneducated -- he had to drop out of school halfway through second grade.  Made his living as a handyman and the like, and in those days (when I was young), supplemented his income fishing in his hut on stilts on the bank of a river with no power or water.  A hole in the floor was his fishing hole, garbage can and restroom.

  So, imagine my amazement when I was a junior in college, majoring in literature and taking a course in Shakespeare and stopped off, textbook in hand, at the local cafe, only to have Johnny -- Mr. Handyman -- come in and sit with me, then casually inquire what the book was, then, when I condenscendingly said something like, "Um, a few hundred years ago named Shakespeare wrote plays and sonets and this is his collected works," to be startled by his reply:

  "Shakespeare!  How I love him!"

  Turned out that some years before Widow Jones (no joke) had hired him to tear down the falling-down storage shed in her back yard and haul the debris away, including whatever contents were in it.  Among those contents was a moth-eaten, ancient, but illustrated edition of the complete works of The Bard.  Intrigued by the illustrations, and long frustrated by his virtual inability to read much, Johnny asked The Good Widow if he could have the book, to which she agreed.

  Then he saved up his pennies until he could buy a primary-level dictionary.

  Several increasingly-higher-level dictionaries and some years later, he didn't merely get the jist of Shakespeare.

  That day in the cafe, he began quoting -- at considerable length -- from various plays and sonnets.  I (and all the ranchers and farmers there, who all forgot entirely about their crops and cows, instead gathering around, agape, asking me if Johnny was nuts) were stunned.  I was quickly forced to start flipping through the pages of my textbook, trying to keep up to confirm the various demands from the crowd, "Is that right?  Did he quote that stuff right???"

  Yeah, it was right.  Like 100% so, over a several-hour period.

  More extraordinarily, unlettered as he was, he had an intuitive and superb ability at literary criticism (which led me to consult my notes from my class with my professor, himself a scholar of world note).

  My professor later met him after I told him about Johnny, and, believe it or not, they became something of friends.  And Dr. Chamberlain alerted the main county newspaper, in which a feature writer did a major spread on Johnny.  And when I took Dr. Chamberlain to meet him the first time, two intellectual giants left this dumb cowboy in the dust pretty darned fast.

  Now, JoyousLoving, is that neat, or what?  In the 30+ years I've been telling and writing that story, I have yet to meet a negative or uninterested reaction.

  And I'm sure you've known someone -- probably more than one -- people who are fascinating.

  They make great topics.

  Like the Congressman father of two of my classmates when I was in junior high.

  Like my classmate and fellow acolyte of years who grew up to be my current Congressman, too.

  Like the Father of one of my very first university students who ended his career as Superintendent of West Point.

  Like the children of two of my friends here, the children actors and singers, and locally quite famous.  And were you to meet them as I have, you would think they were just ordinary kids.  Not.

  And so on.

  Moving away from the area of what to write about, it's true that writing isn't a cup of tea even when you've decided your topic.  You have to find a voice, and select a tone.

  The real trick here is twofold.  First, your job as a writer is essentially the reverse of an actor's.  An actor has to take written material then deliver it in normal speech.  You have to decide what you want to say, but then, for heaven sakes, don't render it into prose as a precise record of the way we would speak in informal conversation, with its uh's, ah's, um's, pauses, breaking off in midsentence, abrupt topic shifts, etc. etc. etc.  Read a court reporter's record to see what I mean.  (Long, long ago in a galxy far, far away I worked in police and security work, so have had to wade through some of that stuff.  I also was active as an actor in community theater in those years.)

  The actor has to make the written word sound conversational.  In that sense, your job is the same, except you're coming from the other direction from the actor.

  Both voice and tone have to fit the topic.  You're not going to write a funny story about, say, a murder, or AIDS, or Darfur.  For instance.

  Lastly, since you mentioned time constraints, please don't forget that some of the most brilliant, memorable writing isn't long at all.  Consider, for instance, Mark Twain's words that went something along these lines (though I'm not sure if I have the quote precisely correct): "One can be an idiot.  One can be a member of Congress -- but, then, I repeat myself."  Seventeen words living a century and a half later.  At the same time, don't use a thousand words to explain or report what 200 words will do.

  I never heard of this site until this morning, and might have glided on by, but the extract from your post caught my attention.  I care deeply about writing, and about encouraging others.

  Ease up on yourself.  Time constraints are a different matter; you have to make your own call on those.

  Hm, one final caution, originally posited in this format, approximately, in the 1930's by an American journalist: "Writing is easy.  All you have to do is to sit at the typewrite with a blank piece of paper in front of you, then wait until little beads of blood pop out on your forehead."

  Don't let the "field of pure snow" get you down.

  And I certainly hope I haven't wasted your time.

  The best of luck to you, should you decide to pursue this.  I hope you do; there are never too many voices, only too few.

  With regards,

  Mekhong Kurt, Webmaster
  www.BangkokAtoZ.com
  Bangkok, Thailand

• MekhongKurt said on Apr 13, 2008....

  An afterthought.  You don't have to get up close and personal.  One of my best friends, who is an artist and has his own website and is a writer, painter, and sculptor, has as his Number One Fan one of my Aunts, whom he's never met, and likely never to meet.  And they're completely opposite personalities.  (I was downright shocked when my Auntie e-mailed me how much she enjoyed a peom he wrote called "To the Virtues of a Prostitute" I had posted.  This is Mom's Kid Sis, a deeply religious, conservative, central Texas gal.  And my buddy is the complete antithesis.  But she corresponds with him even more than she does with me!)

  Well -- okay.  In your writing you do, by definition, reveal something of yourself.  But if you're not ashamed of that self, so in the hell what?  As long as you can look in the mirror without averting your gaze, it's damn sure not up to me nor anyone else to sit in judgment.  [Last I knew, nobody had renamed me "God," "Allah," "Buddha," or whatever.]

  Your call.  You clearly want a blog.  Go for it, if that's your wish.  Heck -- unless you're seeking to make either a name or money or both, does it really matter?  I have a few thousand visitors monthly, and so far, I've never made a dime, but it's gratifying some folks are loyal readers and correspondents.  That's satisfying.

  Mekhong Kurt

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 13, 2008....

  Rupert ~ No offense taken :-)  Thanks for the video, I love it.  I think you are right, I just need to get back to having fun - Thanks again!
   
  Twyla ~ LMAO!  I'm not leaving, I was just having a very down day.  Thank you!
   
  Actorguy ~ I'm glad it doesn't have to be profound cuz then I'd be in trouble! ;-)
   
  Mimi ~ It wasn't my intention to make anyone feel bad :-(  I really appreciate all of the comments and support I've gotten here.  I never expected it and it makes me feel wonderful :-)  You are more than welcome to join us CCL's (crazy cat ladies)!
   
  Ibfno7 ~ That is really deep.  Wow.
   
  Mekhong Kurt ~ Welcome :-)  Thank you so much for your comment, it really touched me.  That's a wonderful story.  You've given me much to think about.

• MekhongKurt said on Apr 13, 2008....

  Morning, JL.  (Well, it's morning on *this* side of the planet, anyway.)
  
  Glad to see you're clearly taking aboard the comments of support and observations of the people who've responded to your original post.
  
  An unrelated question before I forget, one addressed to the community at large: has anyone else had the experience of submitting a comment only to find it didn't upload correctly?  The first time I uploaded, all my paragraphing disappeared.  The following three times there were missing words and misspelled ones (dropped letters), but the fifth time, everything looked good to go.  But I just re-read my own submissions and found a few errors again.  I may just have missed them -- I was awfully tired when I wrote and proofread them.
  
  Back to your blog.  In this Silly Season of presidential politics, I've been reading tons of professional blogs that accept comments, as the ones here do.  I mention those in particular because it's in them I see a disturbing pattern most obviously: "contributors" who use the freedom to comment to launch attacks on people who aren't even part of the story.  Most often, this takes the form of a pro blogger commenting on one of the Democrat candidates with nary a reference to President Bush or the McCain, yet scads of people launch diatribes, very often with gross misspellings and vocabulary/grammatical errors, often in all caps, against Bush, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, blah blah blah.
  
  Gets mighty tiresome wading through that crap.  By the way, I use the above merely as an example, not as an indicator of my own political preferences.  I feel the same in a reverse scenario -- a blog about McCain where some respondent attacks Obama or Clinton.
  
  But here, your respondents all come across as considerate and thoughtful.  That's nice to me as a reader, as I imagine it must be to you as the blogger.
  
  Hope all your tomorrows are brighter than when you wrote the comment spawning this thread!
  
  Mekhong Kurt
  

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 16, 2008....

  I've never had problems with the format of my posts but sometimes they are deleted before I get to post them.  A lot of people write in word and then paste it here to make sure nothing happens.
   
  Thank you! 

• Twylarants said on Apr 16, 2008....

  Pickers~ I give lessons in elderly eccentricity online. Got to www.crankyyankee.org
  (And if there is really a website by that name it ain't me.)
  

• silverwhisper said on Apr 17, 2008....

  JL, i too would notice.
  
  [trout-smack!]
  
  i think that you underestimate what you mean to people, JL. i think that the nagging demon we call self-doubt is really what makes you feel like an outsider.
  
  because i want to let you in on a little secret: you become an insider when you decide you are one, and not one moment before.
  
  now, IMV you've been one for some time and i suspect that others will back me up on that.
  
  [hefts trout]
  
  now don't make me use this again... :>
  
  ed

• JoyousLoving said on Apr 17, 2008....

  Ed ~ lol Thank you :-)  And I'll try not to make you use that trout again!  Self-doubt is something I battle with all the time but I'm getting better.  I think.  Maybe.  I'm not sure.

Comment on "My problem"

Currently tagged	life blogging writing caring (Click to add tags below)
Tag this post	(Separate tags using commas, for example: New York, dating, vegetarian)
Your comment
	Comment Anonymously