Day 22 - What makes you different from everyone else?
Oh, god.
I hate prompts like this. You might as well be asking me what makes me a good writer, or what makes me a good wife, or...
Talking about how I'm different makes me feel like I'm tooting my own horn. I hate tooting my own horn. Mostly because I'm afraid of being wrong about myself. How weird would that be?
Not that weird, actually, because I'm finding, as I grow older, that I really don't know as much about myself as I thought I did.
I think the biggest thing that sets me apart from everyone else is I know I'm an asshole and I admit that I'm an asshole.
The newbs are like, "But you haven't said anything shitty, so far."
WAIT FOR IT!!!!!
No, really, it'll come. And the chances of me apologizing are pretty slim. Mostly because I don't ever mean to be an asshole. I'm just really blunt, and I don't always think about how what I say will sound because I expect people to just know that my intention is almost never to be an asshole.
I mean, it's pretty clear when I mean to be insulting. The sarcasm is so thick it can be cut with a knife, and even in text, you can feel the acid burn of my sharp tongue. If I'm meaning to insult someone, I'm a mean bitch. I'll happily cop to that. It's a defense mechanism I picked up when my ex started cheating on me, and it's a habit I haven't been able to overcome. I'm not even really sure I want to overcome it, to be honest. Because if I've reached the point of intentionally being insulting, you've already crossed, like, twenty lines.
A thing that I feel sets me apart from people on the internet, these days, is I try to understand where a person is coming from before deciding they're not worth my time. I'll debate anything with anybody, and actually listen to what they're saying, and try to understand why they feel the way they do because I feel like it makes it easier for us to find common ground and reach some sort of compromise. If we immediately shut down when someone disagrees with us, and become belligerent and stop listening, we're never going to make things better in this country. So I try really hard not to do that.
All bets are off, though, if the person I'm talking to starts slinging insults. I'll tolerate a lot of things from a lot of people, but that? That ain't one of them.
Do you think this prompt is meant to ask what sets my blog apart from everyone else? Just in case, I'll answer that question too.
I fully intend to be 100% open about everything here (once I'm writing actual posts and not doing this here intro writing challenge)(I just realized that sounded like I'm not being open in this challenge...I am). Even the bad stuff. Except that one chapter I mentioned in another post, and sexy stuff. I have another place for the sexy stuff (which I also mentioned in another post) and I'd be happy to give you a link if you're interested. Drop me a line in email (littleellelllp at gmail) and I'll shoot it over.
I've never really been one to follow blogging "rules" because blogs, for me, are like a personal journal that I let the whole world read, and so I feel like they should develop organically. I'm considering a posting schedule on this blog, though. I'm not making any promises, but I can see how knowing when to expect something from me would make it easier to follow my blog.
There might be other things, but I'm still working out where I'm going with this thing. I might revisit this prompt later.
This series inspired by a writing challenge from Living Off Love and Coffee. Find the full list here.
Comments
Post a Comment