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the slackmistress' first amendment

When I started writing the slack nine years ago, I hadn’t the faintest idea what it would mean with regards to my life. Once a week, I sat down at the computer and penned an article that, if I was lucky, fifteen people would read. I wrote because I had stopped writing and I needed the creative kick to the side of the head. I wrote because there was no risk involved except the risk of putting myself out there for everyone to see.

I never imagined I would have readers. I never imagined I would have an audience. I never imagined I would meet people who knew me solely through words on a screen. Nine years later I have a small virtual community. I have online friends and acquaintances. I have people who love me and hate me and who are emotionally invested in my life.

Nine years later I sit down at the computer and realize that the risks that I take are not all my own. In 1997, I sat down at a computer, a shy, nerdy, overweight girl who adopted a rather silly moniker and blurted out whatever was in my head with no regard as to how pathetic, odd, or stupid it made me look.

In 2006, I sit down at the computer, a confident, saucy, sexy nerdgirl who still utilizes her rather silly moniker who wants to blurt out whatever’s in my head with no regard as to how pathetic, odd or stupid it makes me look.

Except that my life – and my writing – now involves other people. Over the past nine years, the cast of family, friends, lovers and acquaintances has grown. Weaving them throughout the fabric of my personal narrative has proven difficult.

Some hate that they’re not written about.

Some hate that they’re written about at all.

The fact is that I’m not writing in a vacuum. While I choose to put my life on the Internet, I respect that it’s not for everyone. I do make a point to anonymize those detailed in these pages, and if I think a subject is particularly sensitive, I request permission prior to posting my entry.

But the Internet has become a virtual high school, and sites like MySpace and Consumating act as a way of passing private notes in a very public manner. Except that no one is forcing us to read them. But people do. I understand.

What’s worthy of sharing with the Universe? It’s a question that I ask on a weekly basis. I’m fond of saying that the slack is nine years of five minutes glimpses into my head. It’s a set of virtual snapshots. It’s my highlight reel. It’s a week of reality TV footage edited down to two pages.

And last week I did something I’ve never done before.

I took down a slack article.

My seventy seconds of footage unintentionally inspired a minor soap opera or two. What’s odd to me is that had I not written about it, there would have been no drama.

If it’s not on the Internet, I guess it doesn’t exist.

Someone asked me why most of my blog postings are private now. This is one of the reasons why. The other is that not everyone gets a backstage pass to my brain. Just because I choose to make certain things public doesn’t mean that I don’t get to keep certain things private or share them with a smaller audience.

A friend asked me this weekend what it is that I like about writing. I like connecting with an audience, I told him. And the thing I love about the Internet is that it’s connecting with an audience on an insanely intimate level.

Sure, this site is one huge megalomaniacal narcissistic headtrip, but I know that you exist. The site is about me, but I use it to communicate with you.

That’s the rush. You, sitting there reading this, loving it, hating it (the people who hate seem to read more than the people who love. Or at least you send me more email!)

So I’m trying to figure it out. How to share without sharing too much. How to reveal myself without stripping everyone else naked, too. I hate it and yet I get it.

But also get this: I’m a writer.

And this is what I do.