II. Why I Won't Describe Me

Saturday, June 23 1:37pm

I am thoroughly pissed off. After the altogether enjoyable beginning of this journal early this morning, it seems the twelve hours between then and now have been most disappointing. The next twelve don’t seem to hold much promise either, as I embark with half my comically (sometimes) dysfunctional family upon our Epic Voyage to the beautiful state of Tennessee. Since we live in New York, the drive there will devour this perfectly good Saturday, which pisses me off even more thoroughly.

As I consider my anonymity and concurrent desire to complain about people, it seems the only option that won’t cause distressing pronoun abuse on my part is to bestow nicknames upon everyone I discuss. So with that in mind, rest assured that I am lying through my metaphorical teeth when I tell you that the other four people in this jam-packed Honda are my mother Louise, my little sister Kerry, my big sister Jessie, and her four-year-old son Nick. I haven’t told any of them about this blog, but in case I overlooked something when I stripped my profile of all relevance, it feels better for me to change the names. My name, for your purposes, is C. I hate to describe myself beyond the absolute necessities, especially in the first few entries, because unless you already know me (and therefore don’t need any reminders) you have no emotional interest in who I am, and probably very little in what I have to say.

Shoutout to Nick for showering me in choco-crumbs just now, by the way.

And I think a lot of blogs, diaries, and autobiographies are ruined by the albeit-difficult-to-resist prospect of having your life out there to be passionately examined by the deprived-of-good-literature, just-waiting-for-the-One-Amazing-Blog-with-its-One-Amazing-Author-with-which-to-forge-a-meaningful-connection, simply-ravenous-for-wisdom Public of the World. And by the apparently-obligatory résumé that consequentially finds its way to the forefront of the good-intentioned publications, which nobody likes and usually prompts the reader to sigh and continue on its quest for literary sustenance, (a quest similar to, but not the same as, the one described in the previous over-hyphenated run-on) the compassionate or naïve reader pausing to skim and maybe be drawn in by the better parts of the article- this second chance is God’s gift to those authors, a gift I would rather not need. Therefore, you will only know me by examining the character you find in my words, and not by the words I might have chosen to blind your opinion with. If you don’t like it- you would have left by now.