A day of interesting conversations

A reader tells me:

r: your blog is so personal, I could never blog in that way…
nc: personal? I wont even reveal the top movies selected in my name by the “pick-a-DVD service” (see post sometime in January), I write about the most benign events in my life, I say little, if anything, about what I’m REALLY thinking, that’s for email or personal encounters, not for BLOGS…what do you mean by ‘personal’?

r: well, just as an example I would never say where it is that I am traveling..
nc: that is completely impersonal! I write travel stories on the side, that’s how impersonal travel is in my mind. I hosted a travel website for years and wrote constantly about visits to family farms and vineyards in distant places. Writing about travel is not personal, it’s a nudge to look at an issue from the other side of the ocean, with a different focus perhaps…

r: well yes, but you reveal your position in the process of writing.
nc: do I? Are you sure? Maybe sometimes. I suppose. I guess everyone does know whom I voted for. Or, at least it can be assumed. I’ll grant this much: writing a blog is much like going to a dinner with hosts at a foreign university: the same level of detail would go into a conversation there. After a shot of sake, that detail may expand a little, but it will always be a story within the boundaries of that wonderful, yet limited, conversation.