a cowardly, cowering ninny

Over on one of the European blogs, a writer wanted to take a pause for a day (I’m guessing that this was the motivation). He wrote something like this – okay you commenters (he has a fairly regular trickle of them), why don’t you have a conversation among yourselves today? And then he retreated. And they spoke up.

Now, everyone who has ever mentioned the word “blog” to me knows that I am terrified of random people saying random things and so I would never ever enable a Comments function on Ocean. I love it when people write emails to me and I almost always answer. Indeed, I have met some wonderful people in this way. Friends for life and all that. But I am way too marmish and sensitive to give free reign to readers who would, I am certain, slaughter me or something/someone that I care about in public while my attention was elsewhere.

However, today I was tempted, just for this one day, to let people talk while I took a back seat and listened. I have a hell-schedule of teaching and then traveling and I really did not think I could afford to take a moment to post anything. Still, I held back with this kind of an open invitation. Why? Because this is how I imagine the comments would look were I to solicit the words of random readers (I’m making up names, but the personalities are of people that I know read my blog):

Polish kielbasa is inferior to German sausage and in any event I don’t eat sausage. But this does not stop me from posting a comment! Because sausage rules and I rule and you Polish goons, geaks and freaks are all the same, pushing your keilbasa as if it were the import from paradise. Roll out the brats, dude!
-- raving anti-kielbasa lunatic

I came to your blog via xxxx (a PD blog from DC) and I expected some legal insights, given that you are a law prof. I must say I was horribly disappointed. May I suggest picking topics more profound than oatmeal in Pittsburgh or martinis in Madison if you wish to maintain some semblance of a professional reputation?
-- lawyer in limbo

Nie wiem co mam napisac. Na pewno mowisz po Polsku ale ja nic tutaj nie widze co by mi tu odpowiadalo.
-- niezadowolona z Warszawy

Hey muz, how come you haven’t answered our emails in the past 24 hours? And how come you never call? It’s all about your blog now, isn’t it?
-- a *relative* living far from home

I seekth thou, dearest, with sweet suggestion,
For willst thou giveth me indigestion
To think that all doth scorn my syrup
Thou kicketh my ass with one sharp stirrup
-- LDMsquared

O.M.G., it’s that lascivious, lecherous, lunatic again! Get him out of here!
-- embarrassed in eau claire

I recognize the communist overtones in your blog. I looked up your father and learned that he was a member of the Communist Party in Poland during the crucial years of Communism Over There. I am not a communist nor especially loyal to Poland but it pleases me no end to expose you in this way.
--Immigrant from you know where

And so on. Thinking about the range of possible contributors makes me produce more sweat than did the guy at the gym who covered the elliptical machine with a running stream of body water. So, thanks but I am too much of a thin-skinned and tender-hoofed ninny*. I guess I’ll just have to find the time for a (benignly marmish) post myself, work and travel notwithstanding.

*And inevitably someone from my past would write and point out that this was indeed my nickname while in grad school. I won it at a poker game and it stuck.