A first entry

12 February 2005: A First Entry

The first entry of a new journal is, for me, always uncomfortable for being so self-consciously about being the first entry of a new journal. This weblog is a kind of new journal.

I understand much about keeping a personal journal, but know little about weblogging. It feels a little as though I am driving something like a huge waggon for the first time: not only are there are many controls about which I know nothing, but also I fear that the performance of the vehicle will throw up surprises. However, this latter is the principal reason why I wish to write a weblog: to find out what it feels like to do so, and to learn what I am able from the experience. It would feel presumptuous were I to assume that I could achieve competence beyond my already existing IT skills and journalling capabilities, although what I have written also feels like I am bringing low expectations to the experience.

My personal journal is a private document, and I have little experience of sharing its contents. This weblog is a public document, and my thoughts and opinions are open to comment. Past experience of voicing my personal thoughts and opinions regarding anything other than a professional matters is sufficiently unpleasant that it fills me with trepidation to do so. It feels as though I am making myself vulnerable to being hurt again.

Written in this public forum, it sounds to me as though I am pleading to be treated with care. Therefore, a first learning point is that when I express my feelings, my words risk being read as a coded message. This latter is far from the case in my personal journal. Maybe, in fact, people, and not simply other webloggers, from whom one might assume, or at least hope for, some reciprocal care-taking, will not read the expression of my feelings as a coded message. Maybe my fear is my fantasy, based on how I might read similar material. Oh dear! Learning point two: I am self-censoring what I would have written here in my personal journal, regarding the extent to which I bring interpretation to what I read. The privacy of my personal journal means that there is little that cannot be recorded in it. I guess that I have to learn the boundaries of this weblogging medium. Perhaps, more optimistically, I shall also discover the power and capabilities of weblogging .

I have given little thought to how frequently I intend to make entries into this weblog. It will probably be like my personal journal: occasional. I have given even less thought to for how long I shall maintain it. Part of me is inclined for it to continue indefinitely, and part of me wants to experiment with it being time limited. I shall make a decision about this latter once I feel clear in my mind.

I am aware of Thinks, by David Lodge. As a consequence, I feel more self-conscious writing this weblog. A voice (with an English accent) asks whether I am writing this weblog as my version of Thinks. Learning point three: I have written this paragraph after the final paragraph. Unlike in my personal journal, in which the format of each entry is effectively a kind of stream of consciousness, in this weblog I can not only edit as I type, but also revise the entire entry prior to posting, making the process of its creation, and also the final result, more like a web-page. I feel uncertain about whether this program has an on-line spelling checker, and am feeling a little disconcerted because I am used to typing within MS Word, with red and green underlining to help alert me to spelling and grammatical problems. I realise that the box within which I am typing has a variety of controls and instructions above and below, most of which are obvious, but some leading to controls unknown. (Note made later: I have now tried out the unknown control buttons.) Learning point four: what I have just written may be considered boring. I do not write boring text in my personal journal, for what I write is written for my experience of writing it and for my experience of reading it. In this weblog, I am writing with at least some desire to be interesting and/or entertaining, by which I feel confused.

I am finding it hard to think of how to bring this entry to an end. I know that the medium is intended to be informal. I am not really an informal sort of person. I like my SMS text messages to be grammatically correct and properly punctuated. "Loosen up. Live a little" (I must check from which movie this line is taken - my memory says that it is from the night-time kitchen scene in Peter's Friends, but I am unsure, because it is getting confused with the chicken coop scene in The Lady and The Tramp). No, I do not wish to loosen up. I wish to learn. "Okay, then, learn." (Why has this voice in my head a US accent?) Then that is my conclusion: I wish to learn.