(Two, that’s two posts in one day! Amazing! Be impressed. Also, please note that I am not a slacker like some people I know.)
(clear throat)
So, I walked into my grad class last night and one of the other students (I’ve mentioned her before although I just called her my presentation partner for chapter two), smiled at me and said, “Lin-da.” In a very strange tone, like she knows a secret. And turns out she did.
“I read your blog….” she continues.
And I groaned. OK, maybe I didn’t groan out loud, but I definitely groaned inside. Although I think I did say something like, “Don’t tell me that.”
So. Hi Michelle!
Now, pay attention, because this is where Linda confesses something strange, and you realize she is a lot weirder than you ever imagined. (See, I’m even writing in third person, so I am already proving I am weird!)
I have been writing for newspapers since I was in high school, which means I’m used to seeing my name as a byline in the newspaper. I have a very strong audience awareness when I write (in some cases, too strong according to one of my professors). Yet, I still fail to make the connection that there really IS an audience. (Confused yet? Let me try to explain….)
You see, when I write I am sitting in my house, typing onto my computer. It’s just me and my computer (walking down the Avenue, not the ole but the new….) So. Where was I? Right. It’s just me and my shadow, er, computer, and I pretty much just type into the thing. And I don’t think about people actually reading what I write. I mean, I do, but I don’t. As I said, I write with an audience awareness, and by that I mean I realize that I need to provide enough information to orient a reader, to anticipate questions and needs a reader may have and to address those questions and needs in my writing. (However, that doesn’t mean THIS particular post is doing all of that.)
But what I don’t do is I don’t think about people (and by that I define people as in people I actually know, ala someone I am going to have to face in person as I go about my daily life) reading what I write. In other words, I know there are tiny people who live in my computer who I communicate with regularly, but if I’m not logged into my computer, these people do not exist. (Yeah, I know. Shelley, AGK, Teri, Kira, the Kims and a bunch of others are really going to be surprised about that one.) Of course, I know they really exist. After all, one of them is my mother, but I get surprised when something I blog or write about for publication elsewhere becomes an actual topic with me in person.
This used to happen with my sister Dee quite a bit. We’d be talking on the phone, and I’d be telling her some neat story, and she already knew. How did she know? She read my blog. Really? People read this? Real people read this? (Yes, apparently today’s unofficial theme is ‘Linda is delusional.’)
But then there are the weird ones. The ones where I am standing in the grocery store line with my children, buying my weekly groceries, and the cashier recognizes me from reading my column, I’m the Mommy, in the newspaper. And instead of being excited about being recognized, I freak out. I immediately start to wonder — am I buying anything embarrassing? Did I just yell at my kids? You mean real people actualy read that? It’s just surreal.
There was even one time (and Shelley, I believe was a witness to this) when I walked into a session during the Erma Bombeck writing workshop several years ago. And one of the people leaving the previous session, spots me and says, “You’re Linda Sherwood.” Well, yes. But, um, I don’t know you. How in the world would you know me? And the answer was from my (now defunct) web site, Small Town Press. I’d had a photo on there, and she recognized me. And once again, I get floored when I learn that people I know in the box (as in my computer here) really exist out of the box. And that people I know out of the box (Hi Michelle!) now know I’m in the box. So yeah, totally delusional.
Thanks for playing.
