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I haven't been posting particularly much lately. I was trying to figure out why, today. It's not just that LJ and DW have a low rate of response; I'm pretty much used to that by now. And it's not for lack of ideas, as I often find myself writing the beginning of a post in my head as I walk to the bus or while I'm out with the dog or in the shower. (Not all three at once, though. No dog in the shower. We are firm on this point.) Some of it's fatigue, I suppose; it's been a rough semester. And some of it is that all my tiny inconsequential thoughts, and pictures, have moved over to Twitter.
But a lot of it is exactly what's giving me so much trouble in writing this essay tonight. It's a rough draft, see, for a research paper I haven't finished doing my research on yet. And it's supposed to be a rough draft; the prof wants to see a draft of our paper before we get to the final stages of editing and presenting in class, so that she can help us fix major issues well before we've spent a lot of time on them.
And...well. I'm really bad at writing rough drafts. I tend to write in bursts--the "do a little every day, even if you don't feel like it!" advice is absolute murder on my process--when opportunity aligns with my brain having chewed through the writing ahead of me enough to give me a near-final version. I may go back and do significant structural edits later, when I can see the shape of the whole thing, and I do some line-edits for everything but fanfic, but... I don't really have a significant difference between my first draft and my final. It's either nearly there, or it's not worth doing.
And I need to write this rough draft, see. Before I have all the research done (that's my own fault) or my thoughts completely in order. It's not going to be clean. It's not going to be tidy, or need merely a few cosmetic changes and an expanded paragraph here or clarified sentence there. It's going to be rough, and oh, it's like pulling teeth to get myself to write it at all, because my mind's screaming at me that it's not ready to go on paper, yet.
Writing here has become a little like that. Either it's a tiny little comment (so it might as well go on twitter) or it's a long thoughtful piece, and, well, I don't want to put those up until they're really entirely ready to go. But with no schedule or deadlines or explicit audience, these never solidify into something that's ready to be posted: they just slip right out of my head again.
I don't like putting up long thoughtful things that aren't ready. I don't like being wrong. I am not, thank all that's theoretically holy, anywhere near famous enough (even in the micro-fame of internet fandom or the like) to have to worry about my every word being savaged if people feel like it, but... I see that a lot, you know? I don't want to put up something I'm not ready to defend.
And I'm very seldom ready to defend my words. I don't like arguing. If I'm arguing, it feels like something's already gone wrong.
You'll note that this post doesn't have a strong central thesis. It has a general topic, and a sort of take on that topic, but I haven't supported it very well. But I think I'm going to post it anyway, because I hate to have the journal sitting empty looking like I've abandoned it. Which I haven't! I'm just...tired and distracted and busy and on Twitter, and letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Incidentally, I took the GRE last Thursday. I won't have the official scores in for a while, so I have no idea how I did on the written sections, but my preliminary scores on the other sections were pretty good. So there's that.
But a lot of it is exactly what's giving me so much trouble in writing this essay tonight. It's a rough draft, see, for a research paper I haven't finished doing my research on yet. And it's supposed to be a rough draft; the prof wants to see a draft of our paper before we get to the final stages of editing and presenting in class, so that she can help us fix major issues well before we've spent a lot of time on them.
And...well. I'm really bad at writing rough drafts. I tend to write in bursts--the "do a little every day, even if you don't feel like it!" advice is absolute murder on my process--when opportunity aligns with my brain having chewed through the writing ahead of me enough to give me a near-final version. I may go back and do significant structural edits later, when I can see the shape of the whole thing, and I do some line-edits for everything but fanfic, but... I don't really have a significant difference between my first draft and my final. It's either nearly there, or it's not worth doing.
And I need to write this rough draft, see. Before I have all the research done (that's my own fault) or my thoughts completely in order. It's not going to be clean. It's not going to be tidy, or need merely a few cosmetic changes and an expanded paragraph here or clarified sentence there. It's going to be rough, and oh, it's like pulling teeth to get myself to write it at all, because my mind's screaming at me that it's not ready to go on paper, yet.
Writing here has become a little like that. Either it's a tiny little comment (so it might as well go on twitter) or it's a long thoughtful piece, and, well, I don't want to put those up until they're really entirely ready to go. But with no schedule or deadlines or explicit audience, these never solidify into something that's ready to be posted: they just slip right out of my head again.
I don't like putting up long thoughtful things that aren't ready. I don't like being wrong. I am not, thank all that's theoretically holy, anywhere near famous enough (even in the micro-fame of internet fandom or the like) to have to worry about my every word being savaged if people feel like it, but... I see that a lot, you know? I don't want to put up something I'm not ready to defend.
And I'm very seldom ready to defend my words. I don't like arguing. If I'm arguing, it feels like something's already gone wrong.
You'll note that this post doesn't have a strong central thesis. It has a general topic, and a sort of take on that topic, but I haven't supported it very well. But I think I'm going to post it anyway, because I hate to have the journal sitting empty looking like I've abandoned it. Which I haven't! I'm just...tired and distracted and busy and on Twitter, and letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Incidentally, I took the GRE last Thursday. I won't have the official scores in for a while, so I have no idea how I did on the written sections, but my preliminary scores on the other sections were pretty good. So there's that.