I have some sense that I should be sequestering the "sex" posts in some corner of their own, behind a wall that readers have to click "YES I LIKE READING ABOUT SEX" to access. As if to protect them for the horrifying content within. And the more I think about how to do it, the more confused I get. And I think the reality is that I shouldn't do that. The sex posts get to live merrily alongside the code posts and the whatever-else-I-decide-to-write about posts, because they're all part of me, and they're all part of life, and I want to share them all. I am not into this idea of censoring myself; the internet, of all places, is a place to be free, I would say. Certainly enough people seem to use it that way. đ So why shouldn't I?
Relatedly, someone emailed me to say my last post Let's talk about sex baby resonated with them, because they've been thinking about where to put different parts of their creations and whether they should be separated and what that means. And it just feels like too much overhead and confusion to categorize everything, and if I try to maintain a blog for every one of my interests then I will never maintain any of them because that would be way too many blogs - so, it's better to consolidate everything in one weird, wonderful place.
To be honest, I kept hesitating about posting more about sex. Even though I said I was going to. Because it still felt somewhat wrong. "Wrong." (Wrong is a terrible word. Ack!) Then this morning I had a session with my therapist (hi! are you reading this??) and I bemoaned how I get stressed about things - so stressed I throw up and miss work and social events and my life. And we got onto the topic of decisions. I was stressed by browsing through cute clothes online because they weren't quite right and maybe I should buy them but maybe I shouldn't and spending money is stressful and is this retailer ethical and could I make it better myself and what is even the difference between this one and that one?! And my therapist said basically: don't you think that your brain has been trained to be scared of decisions? Hunh. It turns out, I don't think I'm arbitrarily stressed by decisions. Instead, decisions are "dangerous" for me. My brain thinks, hey you better be careful - this is a DECISION and if you do good then you get a gold star, but if you do wrong then you get NO LOVE FOREVER. Or that's how it feels. And "no love forever" is a pretty scary proposition. đĻ
I'm omitting details because I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but suffice to say, love for a child should never be conditional. Discipline and rules and consequences are all well and good, but they mustn't be mixed up with love and safety. If they are, you get me, and me is a mess. A hot mess, but still a mess. đ
But this realization that decisions are dangerous because of my upbringing and not because of actual consequences that will happen to me today spurred something in me. It made me think of the fears swirling around my head about posting blogs about sex. People will judge me? Think I'm weird? Disgusting? A freak? But those things seem so unlikely, or at least unlikely in any way that will actually impact me. If strangers feel them, whatever - too bad for them (teehee!). If I read a co-worker's blog and it had posts about sex I would totally be into it. I would think, yeah, my co-worker is so cool! They are so open! And brave! And sexy! So maybe, if any of them finds my blog, they won't be too offended by it. Or maybe they'll start acting weird and avoiding me and I'll never know why, but you know what? Who cares! đ
If I can reach one person by writing about sex, if I can give one person the courage to talk about their feelings, or the chance to feel validated that they share my thoughts, or a beautiful new piece of knowledge, then f(uck|orget about)[1] my fears.
Anyway, I swear one of these days I'll actually write about sex. Stay tuned, friends and lovers. â¤ī¸
I watched this amazing talk at !!con, which is a fun programming-ish conference with mini 10-minute talks about cute and quirky things. Andrew Yoon's talk was on a recent invention of his: a delicious amazing templating language that lets you write multiple versions of what you mean, so it will decide in the end which version to take. I think this is incredible because, well, decisions. And one of his points was that seeing the different possibilities also allows more opportunities to get to know and understand the creator, which I think is also so cool and such a rich way to use it. Words are cool but MORE is BETTER amiright??? Kidding; words are cool but maybe there isn't a word that exactly perfectly captures the entire concept of what you want to express, but maybe multiple words together is a bit closer to the end goal. Anyway, can you tell I was super enamoured with this concept? Check out the talk (once it's available), it's even better than my rambling!! đ âŠī¸