Thursday, July 2, 2020

"Online Presence"- Twitter and Blogging

So I've got a Twitter account, and I've got a blog.  I'm finally doing what any aspiring writer (and most aspiring anythings) are encouraged to do: I'm establishing an online presence. 

But I'm not thrilled about it, for two main reasons. 

The first is that these platforms epitomize everything that's wrong with the tl;dr (too long; didn't read) attitude so dominant today.  Most ideas are complicated, and they require a lot more than 280 characters or a couple of paragraphs to expound.  By conforming with this culture of brevity, I'm afraid I'm only contributing to the problem

My second concern is that I really have no right to expect anyone to give a damn.  Why should anywhere care what I think?  And if I'm going to be so presumptuous as to request an audience, shouldn't it be for a work I've spent serious time completing?  Sure, I can ask you to read my book, because it represents months of effort.  A polished piece, a novel or a story, is the ultimate distillation of an artist's thoughts and creativity.  But a blog post written between bites of pizza on a Thursday afternoon?  A tweet published on a whim?  Who cares?  I certainly wouldn't.

And yet I'm asking you to read my blog and follow me on Twitter anyway.  (It looks like my self-promotion skills are woefully lacking.)  I hope you'll find something endearing in this forthright disavowal of my own project.  One thing I insist on in my writing is honesty (well, in a certain sense- read below to see what I mean). 

 So, follow me on Twitter! https://twitter.com/BenjaminClabau2

And check back in on the blog!  I hope to keep posting every few days.  

Keep smiling.  Wear a mask.  Black lives matter. 

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