Brought Rocky his apple today. New camera?

Any writer-blogger-public person knows the very particular experience of a private human sharing one’s life with thousands of strangers on the Internet. It is a new kind of relationship, and like all relationships, it takes work and understanding. My blog has evolved into a distinct community, after many twists and turn.   Every now and then our lives – yours and mine – collide in surprising ways, and the results can be exhilarating, infuriating,disturbing, loving and completely unpredictable. On both sides of the blog, we are inventing and participating in a new kind of sociology, a new definition of community, a new sense of self. One day people might be singing your praises, and the next trashing you for what are believed to be poor garbage choices. Often, I write something I wish I had not written about things I wish I had not written about.

I’ve developed an existential theory of blogging, and it works for me. I don’t ever ask myself if anybody will agree with me before I write something. My blog is simply a reflection of where I am in my life at any given time, for better or worse. I don’t spell check it, or re-read what I write a dozen times.  Since the blog is free, I’m afraid it’s take it or leave it, and people often do leave it. I wish them nothing but good. The blog is growing, on track for nearly six million views this year, and my Facebook traffic is up by 50 percent in the last six months. That’s a lot of people following one single life and one learns quickly that everything done or said is liked by some, and not by others. I remember E.B. White asking his readers – who could only communicate by letter – to remember that there were 10,000 of them, and one of him. On the Web, 10,000 is chump change. This is not a complaint. I asked for it, have worked hard for it,  and I love doing it.

Often, the discussions on the blogs center on responsibility and judgement, one of my favorite themes in my life and my writing. On this end, we are frequently challenged to consider what we do, and what we have done,  in public and in considerable and occasionally invasive detail. Sometimes, if I listen, I am grateful. Sometimes not.  It is not a simple thing to discuss your life in public.

I am learning to deal with this new and evolving kind of community every day.

I am asked daily about my decision to euthanize Orson, give Clementine away, send Elvis to slaughter (this sends many shocked people huffing to another blog), acquire Simon, not acquire Rocky, sell the farm. And then, of course there was the global concern about my dumpster, recycling and the Salvation Army.

I am a disciple of Hannah Arendt, the moral philosopher, to whom I turned when I had to decide about putting Orson down (“A Good Dog”) and whenever I have an important decision to make. Arendt preaches self respect. The only person you have to please is you. It is not up to others, it is up to you to make decisions and take responsibility for them. It does not matter what others think, it matters what you think. You do not have to please them, only yourself. I like it even though it is not a popular idea in America right now.

Under this scrutiny and shared experience, my ideas about discussions of responsibility and judgement have evolved and sharpened since I began my blog and my life on the farm.

I do not ask for advice, or seek it or listen to it much. I make decisions first, and then announce them and take responsibility for them. Helps one to grow up. I don’t like to put people in the position of having to support or thwart me. I don’t want blind support – cheerleading – for my decisions. This is not really useful, nor do I want much second-guessing of my decisions, also fairly useless. People who tell me to do everything I want are not really supporting me, they are simply allowing me to manipulate them into supporting me, which I don’t wish to do. People who criticize my decisions are not helping me either, because they don’t really know me and my circumstances. On a blog, people only know what I tell them and that is too selective a prism in which to tell me I am right or wrong. I do not understand why anybody would argue with strangers about their personal decisions. I won’t.

Like politics, judgement and responsibility are personal things. I used to buy or go after everything I wanted right away. Some people were always cheering me on, because they thought it was what I wanted to hear, and I usually listened to the advice I wanted to hear. My beloved 5D Canon Camera is just about shot, and Canon has just announced a spanking new version of the 5D for $3,400. A couple of years ago, I would have asked the world if I should get the camera – mostly by putting it out there – and then  waited for the e-mails to pour in urging me to do it, explaining why I should. Then, having acquired my rationale, I’d hit the buy button. I don’t do it that way any longer. Today I asked my geek-adviser Sara Friedman to see if she could help me sell my Mark I, which I have hardly ever used, on E-bay or on Net. If she does, I might get the new Canon. If not, I will experience the mystical and little-known (to me) pleasure of waiting for something I want. It has taken me nearly many years to get there.

I’ll let you know what happens. The Internet is a good thing in many ways, but it has also made it simple and free to tell everybody in the world what to do and how to live. I don’t do that. First, because I don’t know. And secondly, because it is foundation of the self-determined life, the spiritual life, and the responsible life.