Warning: The following post exemplifies everything that those who are inclined to hate blogs really, really hate. It is housecleaning at its sloppiest and most self-indulgent. All appropriate viewer discretion warnings apply here.
Dear friends,
Those of you who know me well, which, happily, is just about everyone who comes to visit, know that while I joke a lot about being a drama queen, I have a fear of actually being a drama queen. I have a bad habit of taking on more than I can chew, and I am loath to ask for help. I'm a dab hand at telling other people that they should get the help they need, and not struggle unnecessarily, but I am bafflingly, frustratingly incapable of following my own advice. Don't ask me why asking for help is smart and reasonable behavior in other people, but drama-queeny, attention-getting behavior in me. Those of you who spend a lot of time with me IRL -- you know who you are -- know that I am ever so slightly, just a tiny bit, nuts. If by now you are thinking that I should just get to the goddamn point already, you're right; I am protesting too much because it's important to me that you know that if I could just soldier on as always, like the Brave Little Toaster, I would.
In exactly 10 days, Lloyd and I leave for Scotland. Since I will be offline for the first two weeks of May, my plan was to call on all of those delightful folks who kept this space lively and fun while I was in Arkansas last summer, and invite them to resume guestblogging. I had also planned to open up the call for anyone else who was not part of last summer's raucous caucus, but would like to be part of this one; just let me know if you're interested, and I'll send you an invitation to guestblog from the good folks at TypePad. All this would take effect May 1, the day that Lloyd and I leave.
Dear friends, there is a lot going on at Chez PTMYB, but as I also have a fear of this space turning into what my pal Tristan calls a "Today I ate a burrito. I hate my job at the library" blog. (In my mind, I'm hearing a line from "New York Social Life" by Laurie Anderson, in which a friend describes a call-in radio show he's producing, all about why people in the city can't make emotional connections with each other: "But at the top of every show, we're going to say, 'Now, don't call in with your personal problems, because we don't want to hear them!'"
I will leave it at this: I am having terrible problems at work, problems that are bleeding over into my own life (although, thankfully, Lloyd is as sweet, stalwart and loving as he has been from the day I met him), which, unfortunately, includes my writing life. Call it writer's block, call it running out of steam, call it the end of a really good run, but I am out of words, just out of them. If it were just a matter of blog fatigue, I would be a bit more philosophical, but it's not just blog fatigue: I have PTMYB, I have the egg project (which, granted, is still in an information-gathering stage), I have three articles I'm writing on spec for various food publications, I have letters, long-owed, never sent, from people who want to know why I can't take a little time to talk to them. There is an intriguing new contest brewing over at Michael's, there is a brand-new foodie thread at Plastic. There is a veritable playground of words in which I desperately want to play, but I can't, I just can't. At one point, I even found myself with my finger hovered over the nuclear "delete PTMYB?" button -- and again, dear friends, I am embarrassed to admit this, because it sounds so, well, drama-queeny -- but in the back of my mind I know that eventually this whole miasma will pass. I just don't know how it will, or when, or if I will still have friends patient enough to wait for me.
So, dear friends, I am hereby throwing the field open, not waiting until I head to Scotland first. If you have guestblogging access and a burning desire to share something, please feel free to do so. If you would like guestblogging access, click on that nifty "e-mail me" link to the right and I will get you set up sharpish. (Note: that e-mail address links to an account I can't access from work, so if you don't hear from me till the end of the day, do not be alarmed.)
It occurs to me that once I hit "post" on this little whinge, the creative floodgates will break open, I'll be posting six times between now and Saturday, and I will be dead embarrassed at this naked, needy display of mine. You know that if that happens, I will throw myself upon your mercy and promise to never, ever, ever do that again. For now, though, the day in front of me is not rich with promise, and from the vantage point of my lumpy, uncomfortable chair, the odds of a miracle are so small as to require a particle accelerator to be seen.
Dear friends, I can't tell you how embarrassed I am. I would not blame you if you threw your hands up and took your blogrolling business elsewhere. But I hope you don't.
But Snow, you don’t have an “I-ate-a-burrito” blog. Sure, you write about what you’ve had for lunch, but you also write about what you’re knitting, what you’re reading, the lives of the people around you, the lives of other bloggers, your vast store of pop culture knowledge, your observations on the news, and all manner of amusing quizzes. (Has anyone written the “What Quiescently-Frozen Dessert Snack Are You?” quiz yet?)
Besides, there’s just something about the way you write that imbues even what you consider a quotidian post with wisdom and grace. Stop looking at me like that. It’s true.