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So this happened to me on Twitter last week:
@readywriting Dr. Lee, your blog used to be can't-miss, but so much of the conflict has gone away; you trying to find your place in academia
— Adam Schenck (@schencka1) December 4, 2014
@readywriting (2) has been replaced by you being happy, it seems. Where will you find the fire again? My experience of academia is a
— Adam Schenck (@schencka1) December 4, 2014
@readywriting perpetual conflict of fighting against an exploitative system, and your writing used to be about that, but now you're on the
— Adam Schenck (@schencka1) December 4, 2014
@readywriting better side and the conflict disappears? could you write on that? Thanks.
— Adam Schenck (@schencka1) December 4, 2014
I’ll admit that blogging hasn’t come as easily to me lately (wait, I already have here and here and here and here). And part of it is, in fact, the difficulty of blogging when I’m (professionally) happy. The tension never really goes away, however. I still have lots of friends who are mistreated adjuncts, alongside other friends who mistreated faculty and staff. These issues haven’t subsided , but it now seems disingenuous to blog about them, other than to point to others who are writing more eloquently that I am.
Which is what I use Twitter for.
There are plenty of things for me to be angry about (Ferguson, UVA) but I’m struggling with how to write about those issues in this space, especially now that I am out of the classroom. I am listening—really, really hard—to voices around these issues that have long been silent. And so I’m keeping silent. Perhaps that isn’t a great strategy, but sometimes it better just to listen. I’ve instead turned my attention and energy to amplifying voices, getting their words and word out to a potentially different audience.
On Twitter.
I’ve changed. I’ve changed because of where I am in my life right now, and I have been profoundly impacted by various circumstances outside my small, privileged existence. I’m still working through what that means and how to articulate it. So much of it is that it’s really not about me anymore, if it ever really was. Or perhaps, I have much more difficulty making it about me.
And maybe there are (shockingly) things that I’m not ready to put out there (here). Again, it might not seem like it, but there are still lots of things about my life that I don’t want to put here, not yet, and maybe not ever.
These tweets basically sum up the worst fears that I have about my blogging. I think I still have some things to say, some things that need saying, some things that I hope will still have resonance with readers.
It just might not be the same readers. Because I’m not the same person I was when I started this. And maybe when I’m actually ok with that, I’ll be able to blog again with some sort of regularity, clarity, and purpose.
