(no subject)

[oyceter]

I want to make some sort of big post about LJ and communication and how people communicate through different methods, but I'm too tired to actually be coherent, so you all get random thoughts.

fannishly friended me a long time ago, but she only started posting about a year ago, around this time, actually. I started commenting, to find that she a) was my age, b) was from Taiwan, c) went to a primarily English/expat school like me, and d) lived only ten minutes away! So we met up.

(Hey, fannishly, it's an anniversary! Aka, excuse to go out and eat and have good food! Let's go!)

It could have been a one-off thing, but we started watching movies together, and then had weekly movie nights, and then eventually became roommates. All the while, we were still IM-ing, emailing, blogging about our separate lives and our encounters with each other, and commenting on each other's posts on LJ.

It's very interesting because this is the first time I've had both modes of communication available. Actually, I wish it were possible with more people, but since there's that whole geographical barrier...

So sometimes I'll find out about how Angela is doing via her LJ. Actually, that's how I usually find out, despite the fact that we live together. This isn't to say that it's hiding of info. thing; we do the small talk bit and the "how was your day" thing when I get home from work, but a lot of the details get revealed in LJ entries.

Same for me too ... I do try to tell people when I'm feeling bad and stuff, but with a conversation (phone or IM or in person), there's always a sense of 50-50, that the attention should be split equally between participants, especially if it's a one-on-one conversation. In LJ, I don't feel so guilty or selfish going into all sorts of boring personal detail, or going on and on about specific things because it's my LJ.

I was actually a little hesitant earlier on, because I thought it would be odd having the ongoing LJ entries with life commentary with the other person right in the same room, but it's actually been a really nifty thing.

Angela's also a very open person to begin with, which is really nice, since I tend to be more of the passive-aggressive, never bring up bad stuff type. So there's this sort of neutral space in the house, where there are boundaries and etc., but then we each have our own LJs, which are ours.

So even when Angela does post about me in her LJ, I know it's from her POV, not directed at me, and when I respond, I sort of tend to put on my LJ-hat and use it to address the concerns she raises in her entries. And LJ does sort of support that -- the post takes up most of the space and the comments are supplementary (though important and fun).

And a lot of the time it's easier for me to talk about things that are bugging me in my LJ instead of over the phone or in person, because if it's on LJ, I feel less like I'm monopolizing people's time with my problems or making them listen to me yammer on, or etc. I do realize that people who are my friends will want to hear from me, but there's still that bit of my brain that feels awkward.

Anyway. Yes. I have now run out of words, so I will stop.

Comments

[canandagirl.livejournal.com]

I'm new to LJ and it still feels a little odd talking about my life for just anyone to read. I'm sure I'll get over the weirdness in time.

[oyceter]

It is pretty odd. It's really weird when more people start reading too, because then there's suddenly the deer in headlights feel.

[thomasyan.livejournal.com]

Very interesting post. Nothing coherent to say right now, except that I am annoyed that my brother does not skim my LJ. I can understand him and other friends being uninterested in many, possibly even most, of my LJ entries. But I'm disappointed he's not interested in my more personal posts.

Although, one partial explanation is that he *has* said some of my entries have made him mad because they show that we have *very* different attitudes towards some things. I am in fact sympathetic to that. For a long time, it seemed like we had very similar tastes and attitudes, and it does in fact still often surprise me these days to be reminded that that is no longer so true.

[oyceter]

Heh, yeah. I feel sort of bad directing my friends at my LJ though, probably because I vaguely remember some sort of advice column saying that answering "How's it going?" with "Read my blog!" was rude.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

On a related tangent, my boss sits 5 feet from me, and yet 99% of our communication is through email. And it's sort of awkward when we talk face-to-face or on the phone.

[oyceter]

Hee!

Me and Angela and other roommates I've had will even IM each other when we're only about three feet away, without any walls or anything.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Back when I was working at Texas A&M, we'd hired a guy I knew who was on a mailing list I was on to work on a scanning project for us. For a while, he and I took to conducting most of our business on that list - things like "Where are the extra disks?" "In the cabinet to your right" - just to see if anybody else on the list would realize that we were sitting about fiteen feet apart in the same office. Nobody did. At least, nobody yelled at us to stop (we may have been too entertaining for them :D).