I came here tonight to talk about my falling out with blogging, and as I struggled to put words as to why I'm not attracted to this medium right now, the word "boring" was the one I was going to use. Before I went over to read Tom, I was searching up images on google, thinking about piecing together a poster that summarized my ennui, some kind of Blogging Is a Bore poster with an ole hound asleep on a shady porch. That was just one image I was looking for. Because Blogging has become that predictable.
So, in my travels I hop over to see if Tom is still Mexicaning, and to my surprise and joy, I see he is defending my honor over there. I smile. I post my thoughts (below). Then I go back to read what else Tom's been up to.
What I find is this Gem, which, if I were to take it and run with it, which I don't think Tom would mind, I would extrapolate that he is precisely right, not only within American culture as Walmartitis reflects our obsession with the shallow order of things, but also, he is double right in that this very same element is what is BORING ME TO DEATH right now as a weblogger.
There is something to be said for blurring the lines between potatoes and tampons, between phone cards and baking soda.
There is something profound in the brushing up of one against the next.
There is something precious in searching among the unlike.
There is joy in the finding.
Much of that joy is what we once had here in blogland. It's gone missing, for me anyway. Maybe it's behind the Ketchup, just to the right of the motor oil.
I can conjure an image of the place Tom writes about--the casetas telefonicas--if only sort of, because here in the U.S. you can walk into the rare family-owned deli that isn't trying to be Walmart and enjoy the blurring of edges around the meaning and classifying of things.
Tom describes it here: Anyone who has been in a Mexican market knows how their spaces exhibit horror vacui. This sort of aggregating would have a harder time occuring in the U.S., where the borders between kinds of businesses, types of property, and modes of economic activity are more sharply etched in our imaginings of propriety and order.
My dad owned a little Deli. A couple, actually. I think I never said that here. And so, the this-and-that of the Mexican Phone Store tickled me, Tom.
I can say with pride now, then, that my blog is not about journalism or PR or marketing or writing or business. I want my blog to be a Mexican Phone Store and I want to hang out at other blogs that are casetas telefonicas that don't sell phones at all.
What's that in middle isle? Could be meat, could be cake.
You taste it and you tell me.
I'll be back for more on this when Tom takes his post further.
