High on the Smart

Jane Hamilton is wonderful. She really is. Read all of her books right now.
I spent last evening at my favorite bookstore - Jane Hamilton was in town and read from her new novel and then the owner of the bookstore had a few people over to her house for a reception. I got to spend time with a real author. Someone who makes her living writing. Well.
The husband said I seemed giddy when I got home - he asked how many glasses of wine I had (none). He said I was just "high on the smart." I dig that.
It was interesting, one of the women at the reception told Jane that she felt like she really knew her because she had read all of Jane's books. I commented (after the woman left) that I thought that would be really strange to have so many people feeling like they knew me. I mean, I have certainly felt that way - Margaret Atwood, Alice McDermott, Elizabeth Gilbert, David Sedaris, even Jennifer Weiner... you read someone's entire published library and you do feel like you know something about them. And you don't. And you do...
In the conversation I brought up the whole strange intimacy in blogging. Jane and a few other people in the room are not at all interested in the whole blog phenomenon - which I totally understand. There is a lot of crap out there. But there are also a lot of really amazing people out there. (She more or less asked me why I'm not doing any "real" writing if I am blogging every day).
I told her about the people who I know casually, but whose blogs I read faithfully. There is this weird sense of intimacy and friendship that does not necessarily exist in our "real" lives - I know about their anxieties and fears and hopes but when I see them in those casual, social situations it's very much "Hi, how are you?" "Fine, how are you?" "Fine." Much more French Primer conversation than Oprah's Book Club, you know? They have their own circle of close friends (as well as their blog) and I am really just a reader, not a friend.
I think there are a few things about this that are really important. Everyone has their own set of struggles and making it through the day often requires a serious amount of suspension of disbelief. You see someone you don't know very well and she has clearly been crying. You ask her how she is and the answer is "Fine." My father in law (terminal lung cancer) will tell you and anyone else who asks that he is fine every second of every day. The correct answer is "not fine," the lie is obvious, but the road to fine is paved with little white lies about fine. "Fine" helps us put that problem (or set of problems) down. "Fine" helps us remember that standing in line at the grocery store is not really the best place for an emotional meltdown. "Fine" reminds us to put on our big girl panties and get through it. Fake it til you make it, right? That's how I made it through two years of infertility treatments when everyone around me was popping out babies like it was a contest. That's how my friend Mary made it through (is making it through) her husband's death. That's how we all roll, isn't it?
And blogging helps us be honest with at least a few of those fringe people in a way that is controlled and unobtrusive. We can say, "No, I'm not at all fine and here's why" and still maintain the public "I."
Blogging is also - for me anyway - becoming a faster alternative to calling everybody back. I have become that person I hate the most - I do get phone messages, but usually by the time I have time to call you back it's 3 am or I'm so tired I can't remember how I know you.
Blogging is also great for sharing information that is really important to you - and probably just you most of the time. The new baby, the new house, the knitting... but if you're blogging it interested people will self-select and people who feel they "should" be interested can skim and look at the pretty pictures.
I know that it it primarily bloggers who read my blog so I'm preaching to the choir, but these little things seem important - or at least interesting in terms of the ways in which communication styles are changing.

So anyway, four or five years from now, if Jane Hamilton publishes a book in which one of the characters is a blogger you'll know that I helped plant that little seed.

And if I actually manage to write something more than just this little blog you'll know that Jane Hamilton did that.