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A month or so ago, Catherine and I were driving along in her car when a song came on the radio that gave us both pause.

Not because it was extraordinarily awesome, and not because it was extraordinarily bad, but because it was just so… typical.

So typical that it stood out, much like a man in Dockers at a punk show.

I’ve long been of the opinion that girls today are being screwed over by the images and ideas in popular music, just like the girls in my generation were… except MUCH, MUCH MORE SO.

The lyrics aren’t getting any worse (per se), and the women aren’t any more tarty than they once were (though you could argue that… at which point I’d offer you the full Samantha Fox discography, plus a reel of Tawny Kitaen rolling across the hood of a car in a Whitesnake video and Loni Anderson on WKRP) but now the messages are being couched in self-empowerment.

Your sexuality is a carnival, a resume and a weapon all rolled up into one.

But.

The song in question:

There’s more to me than meets the eye
so come and look inside
Go deep…
‘Cause beauty’s more than skin deep

Okay, try and ignore for a second there that they rhymed “deep” with “deep” (though that would solve the “what rhymes with orange?” dilemma: orange!), and the auspicious presence of two full-blown cliches in the space of four lines.

No, when you read those lines, you think, “Well, that’s good! There is more to me than meets the eye! And beauty is more than skin deep! Yeah! Boys! Check me out — I have substance, even if I don’t own a thesaurus!”

Then you get a little more understanding of the kind of girl we’re talking here:

Don’t need to know the kind of guy
who’s quick to drop the fly
Wham bam!
That ain’t who I am…

Ah! So you’re not planning to date within the NBA? Good for you.

Then it falls apart like a cheap Victoria’s Secret “Angel” bra culled from the sale rack.

Don’t a-let my booty beauty
be the only reason you wanna ride
Don’t a-let my hottie body
jack the fact that I got a lot more in mind

It sounds good — I mean, you want people to look past your hotness to your internal awesomeness, right?

But was anyone really paying attention after you said “booty beauty”? And more to the point, can you say it six times fast?

This is the dilemma of late teens/early twenties/(oh, who am I kidding) early thirties women today.

We’ve turned into nudists screaming at people not to stare at our bits.

“I am proud of my body! I love my body! Look at my sexual empowerment! Do you see my ass? It rocks! HEY! STOP LOOKING AT MY ASS! BEAUTY IS MORE THAN SKIN DEEP! BUT I DON’T BLAME YOU, THESE JEANS MAKE MY ASS LOOK AWESOME!”

It’s a little confusing.

Then we get to the chorus:

If it’s just the physical
It would be sensational
But if you really got into me
You know you’d be insatiable

I get the whole point: I’m pretty freakin’ hot and you’d be lucky to have me but DID YOU KNOW I ALSO CAN DISCUSS CAMUS AND HAVE A CERTIFICATE IN THAI COOKERY?

Why do we always need to make such a point of our sexual identity in the first place, though? Why do we have to be so bluntly, obviously, blatantly hot as hell and THEN, once we are SUPER SEXY WHOA, be something else, too?

I suppose it comes down to this:

The culture we’ve developed for young women has made blunt-force sexuality synonymous with empowerment, and THEN asked those same girls with the visible thong and two-foot cleavage to make sure that men notice their heart, too.

(Well, I guess it IS sticking right out there…)

How about we don’t dress them up like Paris Hilton, and then ask them to tuck a copy of the Iliad in their hobo bag?

How about we keep Joe Francis away from institutions of higher education, unless he’s taking a class in NOT BEING A COMPLETE ASSHOLE?

How about we tell them to ignore any man who needs reminding that they have a brain?

Don’t get me wrong — I LOVE a good wallop of chemistry to get things going, and there’s nothing wrong with enjoying that chemistry and sexuality in general. Girls can like that physical spark as much (or more!) than guys. And perhaps I own one or two shirts that don’t come all the way to, say, my chin.

Sex is not a bad thing. (Unless Joe Francis is involved.)

But I’m tired of watching young girls try and be everything at once, and only succeeding at communicating one aspect of who they are because we’ve taught them nothing about subtlety or true self-respect (or how to put on clothing that covers their drafty parts).

Maybe I’m just getting old.

Or distracted by my own hotness.

It’s hard to say.

LOOK AT MY NAVEL! I KNOW DEAD LANGUAGES!

I have a hard time defining beauty.

I just can’t quite get there.

Besides… everyone has already tried.

No description is so original as most of us wish it were, when we tuck cards in bouquets of flowers, or write vows, or make passionate declarations to someone new, or try desperately to pen a verse that lasts past a breath.

You’ll come up with decent definitions on occasion, but those notions are by their very nature transient; ideas specific to a certain space, a certain time, a certain experience.

At other times, you’ll fail miserably, and wonder why the right phrase seems so elusive when there are so many words to choose from.

The truth is that we all see beauty so differently that any attempt to find a common definition fails like a conversation at the Tower of Babel.

I was once told that all poetry was based on the effort to say what was beautiful, whether by capturing magnificence with some accuracy — as though it were something you could measure! — or trying to illustrate just the opposite, in hopes that a comparison would bring true meaning to light.

I’d say that’s far too sweeping. Some poetry is just about leaky faucets or grandmothers.

Not that there isn’t something impossibly gorgeous about a falling drop catching sunlight at the end of a polished metal fixture, or the face of an old woman, etched with lines and history.

But.

Someone else told me that if you spend your whole life trying to say what beauty is, you will be too tortured to sit back and appreciate it. All you can do is look and feel and experience and know loveliness around you, and accept that you’ll never manage to communicate how it changes you inside.

I’m not sure who has it right.

Like I said — I probably won’t ever know.

I’m certainly not eloquent enough to put it in concrete terms, nor wise enough to let it be.

All I am sure of is this:

that which catches my breath and opens my eyes

that which straightens my spine and quickens my gait

that which grows and bends and twists and encircles

that which comforts and inspires and draws me in

that which launches me into the sky like a push on a swing

that which teases and topples and twirls me about

that which whispers reassurances and tells sly jokes

that which makes me feel at home and abroad all at once

that which is solid as the earth beneath me, and as quick to change as the clouds overhead

that which I see in you, and none other in the same way

Well… that’s my beauty.

And that is good enough.

Now that’s a hell of a title, no?

If you’re brand new to my blog, you might not know (and hey, that’s just fine! After all, it’s not really something that would come up if I met you at a dinner party, anyway… “Hi! I’m Debbie!” “Oh, hi! I’m Meg! I’m infertile!”) that my internal girl-nesses are not functional for the baby-making.

I wrote about it here and here (and lots of other places, but I’ll spare you a day’s worth of angst reading.)

(And any more parenthetical remarks, for that matter. For now.)

It’s funny — since I got this difficult news, it seems like pregnancy and baby-lusting and maternity whatnots and celebrity child coverage have become (even more of) an obsession in my part of the world.

Everyone is having kids, planning to have kids, worrying about how to raise their kids, freaking out about star “baby bumps” or getting the latest photo of Brangelina or Bennifer offspring — or, if they don’t have a pregnancy happening in the immediate future, fussing that they won’t be able to have kids at all, or that they’ll have to wait until childbearing becomes a high-risk proposition.

Add to that the explosion in trendy fashions for moms, a thousand chic new entries into the diaper bag market (hint: if it looks like a diaper bag, you’ve probably bought the wrong one), and concert t-shirts for the 6-12 month set.

Add to that the thousands of blogs written by moms and dads that are chronicling the first years of parenthood in extreme detail. Or the blogs that cover the torturous experiences of those families trying to have their first (or second, or third, or fourth) child who struggle with an inability to conceive, or to carry a child to full term.

Add to that all the websites that have sprung up offering parenting advice and parenting news, along with a healthy dose of targeted advertising and merchandising.

Add to that all the new terms that this generation and the one before have coined to add a little “quirk” or “cool” to their child-raising experiences, like “yummy mummy” or “hipster parents.”

Add to that the fact that my friends have been having little ones for more than a decade, and that I’ve been to more showers and hospital waiting rooms and delivery suites and christenings and dedications and first birthday parties than almost anyone I know. I am the Universal Auntie Meg.

When you put it all together, it’s a pretty sure recipe for insanity at times… or, at the very least, a little self-loathing. Whether or not that’s a reasonable response.

Sure, I don’t have a husband or a nest egg yet — and I know that both of those things will need to be a part of my baby plans, given the expense of adoption and my lack of desire to do it all alone (though that’s not a given, either.)

And of course, I know that everything will work itself out in time. It generally does. Besides — when it doesn’t, you find a new way to deal.

But man… this has been a tough year.

Sometimes I feel great about the entire thing, knowing that I will get the opportunity to help out a birth mother who needs a different life for her child than the one she can give. I’ve never lacked confidence in my ability to love any baby in my arms, whether I had to do 24 hours of labour or 24 hours of paperwork to put them there.

Sometimes, though, it puts an ache in the pit of my stomach or the centre of my heart that will not go away. I wait for it to pass, and that’s all I can do.

I think it’s changed me a little — toughened me up, made me a bit more resilient, given me a bit more perspective. On the other hand, it’s also softened me in ways I wouldn’t have foreseen, and made me a more thankful soul.

I know that when I finally DO have a little one of my own, I’ll be grateful and blessed beyond imagination. I always would have been, but now I know what it’s like not to take that for granted.

Still, people ask me all the time how I handle the whole thing… what my coping mechanisms are, what my advice for fellow “infertiles” (and I hate that term, for the record) might be, what drives me nuts about our baby-obsessed culture.

That’s why I’ve put together a quick list (because OF COURSE I’d make a list) of how to survive the ups and downs of an infertility diagnosis without going absolutely bajiggity. Bear in mind, I’m just a year into the whole thing, and I haven’t even started to work through it with a mate and face the bureaucratic snarl of adoption, as I said.

BUT.

1. Expect that some people won’t know what to say to you about the whole thing. They’re not trying to ignore you or disregard your experiences. They just have no idea what you need from them, or what you might be going through. Don’t write them off if they don’t step up to the plate with a heaping dose of comfort.

Be real about where you’re at, and share as much of your life as is appropriate, given your level of intimacy. Just as you probably don’t need to share your FSH levels with the guy in the next cubicle, you should feel comfortable telling your best friend you are upset about your ovaries leaving you high and dry, even if the only thing they can think of to do is hug you or buy you a coffee.

2. Expect that some people will say WAY TOO MUCH to you about the whole thing. Many people have some friend/relative/coworker who struggled with infertility, and will feel compelled to offer you all the gory details of what they went though, and their treatments, and what you should do that Cousin Michelle did with the naturopath because it worked out really well AND it cleared up her skin!

3. Expect that all the baby stuff going on around you will upset you now and then. Not because you are a jealous, evil, withered harpy, but because it’s hard to watch other people go through a really amazing experience that you might have to experience in a different or delayed way.

Not that it won’t be great when it happens — people will tell you this constantly, by the way, and they mean well — but it hasn’t happened yet. Let yourself feel that. Cry if you need to. Rant if you need to (though not at someone’s baby shower, ok?)

4. Expect that your friends who are pregnant and having babies will feel really weird about sharing their joys with you now and then. They don’t want to feel like they’re gloating. So ask them questions. Your circumstances should never cancel out their own.

And the same goes with new moms needing to complain to you when they feel like their pelvis is going to split in two, or that they might give away their sleepless newborn. They might hesitate, not wanting to look like some sort of ingrate. Do the same thing as when life is going swimmingly in babyland — ask them questions. Keep the communication flowing.

Don’t become the person people need to tiptoe around. That just makes for sore feet — and a pain in the ass.

5. Expect that your family will struggle with the whole thing. It’s especially an adjustment for your parents to make, if they tend to be pretty involved in your life in the first place. They won’t get all the “belly photos” and ultrasound photos and hospital photos and the horrible stories of long labours and frenetic trips to the hospital to tell their friends. And more importantly, they love you. They hate watching you go through something difficult. They might not even handle it well or say all the right things.

That’s when you remind yourself that they love you, and get over it. And tell them you love them — and that they need to get over it.

6. Expect that you will feel a bit weird about the whole thing with men, if you get your news when you’re a single girl. Do you tell them right away? How long do you wait? Do you wait until they mention their family plans, or what? How long can you wait to say something until you’re just being a bit false?

Well, of course, it ain’t first date material. But it’s not something you wait to say until you’re engaged, either. The secret is to make it as little of a bomb as possible, without being untrue to yourself. If they don’t react how you expected them to react, resist the urge to clam up or freak out or break things off immediately (unless the response was really offensive, in which case, don’t waste your sexy years on some moron, thank you very much.)

In a case like mine, kids are a very important part of my life anyway, so I doubt I’d be dating a guy who didn’t feel somewhat the same way about munchkins. I might be inclined to say something sooner than later if things were getting serious. But likely not after the first kiss.

7. Expect to have days where you want to do tons of research on your health and on adoption, and days where you just don’t even want to THINK about it. Both are completely okay. Go with it — and don’t freak out at anyone if they approach you with an article on a day when you do. not. feel. like. reading. about. this.

8. Expect that other people will have very complicated feelings about all your options for having a baby, either because of their own experiences, or because they have particular ideas about what is best for you. Be willing to listen to what they have to say, but know that what you want and how you feel is what matters in the end. For example, if adoption freaks you out, it freaks you out. This doesn’t mean that you are maligning adoptive parents or adopted kids or birth mothers or anyone else.

Adoption hadn’t even really occurred to me before I got my diagnosis. That’s just the truth of the matter. This doesn’t make me a bad person who wouldn’t love my own adopted child. It just means I hadn’t thought about it yet.

Well, that’s my two cents. Or eight cents.

In all honesty, I’m still hoping to do all the right things with my health and find out from my doctor that something miraculous is possible.

But this is the life I have now, and this is the wisdom I have now.

As my Nonna told me once, “If you learn something good, you might as well share it, just in case someone else needs to learn it, too.”

Hey, girl.

How are you? I feel like we haven’t talked much lately.

I can tell you’re thinking about a lot of stuff, but it seems that you’re keeping it close for now.

And while that’s cool, I just wanted to check in to make sure you were moving forward, and not stuck in some sort of Meg-shaped holding pattern.

You can get like that, you know.

Stuck.

On thoughts, on people, on regrets, on worries, on ideas, on memories.

I don’t really understand why you do it, other than the fact that you tend to relive mistakes until they’re burned into your brain deeply enough to terrify you into not making them the next time.

Then you make them again.

Because that’s you, honey.

You like to create some sort of wacky consistency in your life by reintroducing the same damn stress into your world over and over.

Procrastinate? YES! Skip doctor’s appointments? YES! Put off difficult conversations? YES! Deny yourself experiences you’ve been longing to have? YES! Worry about how other people will react? YES! Hesitate on big moves? YES!

It’s the craziest thing.

You dance and sing and caffeinate and spin through life with a grin, but the whole damn time, you’re frozen on the inside, waiting to be confident enough to act on stuff that actually matters. Stuff that might actually change your life.

I watch you do it. It hurts me sometimes, actually.

Why don’t you want to be the same girl all the way through?

Why don’t you want to be as confident about making a plan and sticking to it as you are about bursting into song on a street corner?

Don’t let your heart break because you feel the need to pretend that this is enough. Or that you’re satisfied with halfway.

GET the enough. GET the more. Stop worrying about it and do it.

Then come tell me about it.

Because it’s been a while.

And I miss you.

Love,

Meg

Wow! Look what I got from the lovely and brilliant Monty and the equally awesome Barbie! It’s the Thinking Blogger Award!

You guys are the best. And yes, I know I am formatting this all wrong, but it’s early and Game Seven is tonight, so I’m a bit of a flake. Which, now that I think of it, is nothing new…

First off, Barbie: Thank you so much for writing so honestly about your life and sharing all your joys and struggles and opinions and loves (and pictures of Moo.) I love how much we have in common (ugh, the health issues!), and most of all, that we share a common disease that NO one really recovers from: HOCKEY! Woo! You’re a great girl.

Monty: You probably make me think more than ANY other blogger I know, mostly because you are a beautiful and true writer and a deep (and gritty and real) ponderer, and partly because we have the best (and sometimes most fiery!) conversations via email. You are a kickass parent and a wickedly funny woman. You have also been there for me whenever I needed it, and that has been a blessing. I love what you do, and you do it brilliantly — so keep doing it! And I love that we can disagree and still find acres of common ground in the end.

It’s my job at this point, from what I understand, to nominate five more people for this award. Which is easy to do. Because I know a lot of thinky people.

Now, since I can’t nominate these women again, and since I only get five…

1. I love how Wood and Dutch write over at Sweet Juniper. They’ve made me laugh until I was crying, and then… well… cry because I was crying. Dutch’s parodies are brilliant beyond brilliant, their playlists have pointed me in the direction of some excellent tunes, and their site and product recommendations are always spot on. But I love to read MOST about their relationship and way they navigate the tricky waters of parenting. And their little girl, Juniper? Gorgeous.

2. Dick is one of my old buddies from the Salon days. His blog covers everything from the personal to the political to the poetic, and flows so beautifully that you never notice the stitches joining his thoughts. He’s also a musician, and heaven knows I cannot help crushing on “band boys.” His kids are also unbelievably sweet.

3. Liz is one of my most forever-y readers, and the kind of writer I aspire to be someday. She just has a way of saying things that is so absolutely and totally RIGHT. I love hearing about what she’s thinking, what’s she’s feeling, what she’s up to, and what she’s passionate about. Plus, she’s in Sweden, which makes everything more fun, especially town names and food names. I also love her amazing photos. Well done, girl.

4. I really should NOT give Eric this award. Not because he doesn’t make me think, and not because he’s not a fabulous writer and an amazing friend. No, he just SUCKS at updating his blog. Mind you, he used to be really good at it, and we’d all spend tons of time there trying to follow the quirky trajectory of his thoughts. But now? Now he wears Waldo shirts and claims to be too busy lighting stuff to write. Go there anyway, and read his archives. I’m sure he’ll get off his ass soon.

5. It wouldn’t be right not to nominate my original blog fairy godfather, Chuck. He is a terrifically gifted writer who thinks deeply and then pours that depth onto the page without being maudlin or saccharine. He also encourages me in my own work more than almost anyone I know (and that’s hard to do… I know pretty encouraging people!) I love that he’s always coming up with weird projects for us to write together — projects we never actually end up doing. But they always sound fun.

Honestly, I could give you twenty more. But a good way to figure out who makes me think is to click “Sweet Reads” up there and see what you find.

Big love to Monty and Barbie! I’m honoured.

And now the purple dusk of twilight time
Steals across the meadows of my heart
High up in the sky the little stars climb
Always reminding me that we’re apart
You wander down the lane and far away
Leaving me a song that will not die
Love is now the stardust
Of yesterday
The music
Of the years
Gone by

Sometimes I wonder why I spend
The lonely nights
Dreaming of a song
The melody haunts my reverie
And I am once again with you
When our love was new, and each kiss an inspiration
But that was long ago, and now my consolation
Is in the stardust of a song
Beside the garden wall, when stars are bright
You are in my arms
The nightingale tells his fairy tale
Of paradise where roses grew.
Though I dream in vain, in my heart you will remain
My stardust melody
The memory of love’s refrain.

From out car windows on all-night road trips…

From early morning walks to the pool to swim shivering laps…

From the backyard on a fireplace-scented fall evening…

From a wobbly canoe gliding along the coastline…

From a dew-soaked hill in late August, flat on my back…

It’s a good thing to look up at the stars and be reminded of how small you are.

There are few things in life that confuse me more than people who believe passionately in human rights and social justice… and then show no grace to the people in their own lives.

I just don’t get it.

How can you work for the rights and freedoms of people thousands of miles away and then treat your friends/family/co-workers/random strangers around you like assholes?

The reality is that people across the world — or across town — will always seem more worthy of your effort or charity when the people in your own life disappoint you.

You can idealize their struggle because it doesn’t impact your daily existence.

And that disconnect between the personal sphere and the external world is what leads to a sort of ideological tunnel vision. Tunnel vision that taints our most noble goals with irony.

Tunnel vision that divides the world into two groups: deserving and undeserving.

I’m not against anger and frustration at the state of the world. Not even for a second.

How anyone turns on the news or flips through a paper or walks down the street without developing a raging disenchantment with so much of what goes on around us, I don’t know. I can’t say enough about how much I respect those who work to restore the rights and freedoms of marginalized people in our society.

But I also don’t know how you can desire hope for some people, and then treat the people you are mandated to care for personally… well, like shit.

Yet we fail to question this brand of emotional compartmentalization.

I can’t imagine how the world would actually change if every person made an effort to show mercy to all those they connect with in the course of a day.

Would it be hard? Yes.

Would it be reciprocated all the time? No.

Would it feel stupid a good portion of the time? You know it.

But our small scale bonds within our marriages, relationships, families, friendships, workplaces — even the way we interact with strangers on the street — are the connections and disconnections on which tribes and sects and factions and movements are built the world over.

Are you more noble because you verbally abuse your spouse, instead of making her wear a veil?

Are you more noble because you write a blog post about how much you hate someone who disagrees with you, instead of punching them in the face?

Are you more noble because you despise your father for his political beliefs or lack thereof, instead of denying him the right to have any views at all?

Are you more noble because you judge your mother for her religious convictions or lack thereof, instead of putting her in jail for what she believes?

Are you more noble because you are simply rude and thoughtless to strangers, instead of murderous?

You can justify it all you like. You can even call it “tolerance”, because you’re not hurting anyone, right? And you’re standing up for the right things!

Everyone believes that, though.

Some of the most evil people on the face of the earth believe that their anger towards others is utterly justified and right and good.

They just take those feelings one step further.

Instead of seething about someone, they blow them up.

And if that choice is where you think hate becomes a problem, think again. Where do news events and wars and criminal legacies and political dramas begin?

I think they begin with people just like us who made the wrong choices based on what they believed was right, whether yesterday or 300 years ago.

The kind of choices we face every single day.

And all it takes is one choice for everything to fall apart.

I would put forward the notion that our hope lies in consistency. That our hope lies in recognizing our personal responsibility towards the health of our society. That the only way to keep passion and conviction in our beliefs is to move forward in grace and hope and love, not misanthropy.

That we become the people we expect others to be.

And I believe this will be what keeps us committed to bringing soldiers home from war. This will be what keeps money flowing towards gifted people trying to cure diseases. This will be what will end child poverty. This will be what makes a dent in religious intolerance.

I truly believe that this is what will let you sleep at night in a world where everything happens for the wrong reasons.

Find a way to change the five feet around you, and the five hundred thousand miles beyond will come, too.

I’m not perfect. As far from it as you can get, really. I know I can be an asshole. And I don’t get this right all the time, by any stroke of the imagination.

I just want more light in my life than the one at the end of the tunnel.

• Create emotion-themed playlists in iTunes (ANGRY! saaaaaaad…. Happy! Conflicted?)
• Do stretches before bed again… they worked! What?! (In other words, I enjoyed about 40 minutes more rest by falling asleep more quickly, which is a MAJOR BREAKTHROUGH for the Patron Saint of Insomnia)
• Find a good carbonara recipe
• Choose new hairstyle that makes me look neither shaggy, nor uptight, nor cougar-ish, nor trying too hard, nor domesticated
• Start actually taking useful notes in Moleskines
• Marry John Legend, even if his lyrics make him sound like a cheating git (not so much on the new album)
• Look into voice lessons
• Book time off work in summer to force myself to vacation
• Make dentist appointment to fix the damn chip on my FRONT TOOTH
• Finally put endless stream of laundry where it belongs in my room
• Choreograph interpretive dance to Brian McKnight’s “Back At One”
• Eat entire roll of SweetTarts
• Make sudden and horrible realization that tomato products of all kinds make my body unhappy (Seriously. It’s the common thread….!)
• Plan tomato-free week
• Laugh at the phrase “tomato-free week”
• Stop bitching about shoes, be thankful I have them
• Get over weird obsession with Weather Network

important message you can take with you.

I’ve been noticing lately that more and more of my favourite bloggers are dealing with bizarre, angry commenters, weird email stalkers, and brazen plagiarizers. And the worst of the lot?

Bloggers who pen entire POSTS mocking the parenting skills or intelligence or ethics or eye color of their fellow writers.

It boggles the mind, really.

Not the notion that people can be odd, obsessive freaks — I learn that lesson each day on my commute — but rather that anyone would take the time and effort to make people they’ve never met feel vulnerable and attacked.

It’s silencing people who have excellent voices, excellent hearts, and excellent minds.

Making them question their vocation as full-time writers, even, completely away from their writing on the web.

And it’s wrong.

I’ve had my share of weird, presumptuous correspondents — some even abusive — and a few fairly shocking comments at my blog, but I guess I’m not much of a lightning rod.

No sex, no parenting, no religion, no politics.

Basically, this is a website about my need for more caffeine and my desire to live amongst penguins. Perhaps an entry or two about lip gloss?

And while many mental health professionals would have a field day navigating through my posts as a result, truly loopy people don’t find much to freak out about. I’m not saying that it won’t happen someday, but for now? I’m getting off easy.

But my friends — people who write brilliant and wise things on subjects that actually matter — are having to make major decisions about the safety of their families in response to those who feel that intimidation and abuse are their anonymous (or not-so-anonymous) rights on the Web.

It’s completely ridiculous and unnecessary, and it needs to stop.

Now, I’m not naive enough to think that anyone will ever wrangle all the assholes into submission and calm the Internet into a state of semi-grace. It’s a sad fact that there are too damn many jerks pounding away at their keyboards, taking sick delight in seizing power from people who actually have something to lose.

They’re the ones making inflammatory and threatening comments, trying to create conflict where none is necessary. They’re the ones who send vicious mail to mommy bloggers because they made some cosmic mistake like feeding their child a donut. They’re the ones who take other peoples’ pictures and writing and pass them off as their own. They’re the ones who believe that debate is a bloodsport, whether it be political, social or anything in between.

They’re the ones who infect peoples’ screens with hate. They’re the ones who use their OWN blogs to comment on how other people live/work/write/exist… and then send their anger zinging towards their targets with trackbacks.

It’s censorship via intimidation, and a sad, sad end to too many positive forms of expression.

So.

Here’s my set of thoughts — just in case you’ve happened by here and you might be one of these people OR you’ve ever considered being one of these people OR you’ve got these people lingering around your web site or your life — on how to not be a troll, how to not get bitten by trolls (as much you can avoid it), and how to make your website, well… unfriendly to the unfriendly.

I’m certainly not saying I’m an expert — on ANYTHING — but I believe these things with absolute conviction.

Take it with a grain of salt and a scotch bonnet pepper.

If you are a troll — OR if you’re about to get angry on someone else’s web site:

• The existence of content you disagree with on the web is not an invitation to attack.
• The existence of an email address is not an indication that someone is “asking for it.”
• Unless they mention you, they are NOT SPEAKING DIRECTLY TO YOU. They don’t know about that thing that happened with your mom, or that you work at Wal-Mart. Take it easy, tiger.
• Contacting someone outside of the normal bounds of their web site is flat-out unacceptable, unless you’re been invited to do so. Their relative attractiveness is not an excuse.
• If they don’t contact you back, DON’T CONTACT THEM AGAIN. Don’t assume the email got lost in the mail. Let it go.
• If they ask you not to contact them, DON’T CONTACT THEM AGAIN. They said NO.
• If you are offended by someone’s blog entry or content and they make you genuinely angry to the point where you can only speak abusively, your comment is going to be worthless anyway. They (and their readers) are not going to change because you rant at them.
• The only hope you have of convincing someone to agree with your point is to offer a non-threatening, well-reasoned response.
• Non-threatening, well-reasoned responses NEVER include the following words or phrases: “I hope you die”; “Your mother must not have breastfed you”; “You are going to ruin your children”; “You are a major prick”; “I want to kill you”; and “I know where you live.”
• Sometimes NO response is your best bet.
• “Teaching someone a lesson” is the weakest excuse for assholism on the Web.
• Being respectful to others is not “fawning” or “blowing smoke up their ass.” It’s common decency.
• Check out the tone and the readership of the site you’re at. If no one else is screaming f-words and threatening babies, it’s likely that no one will appreciate that about your comment. If they are, however, go nuts.
• If your comment gets deleted, that is a major red flag. Posting, “Hey, did you delete my comment?” or “Why did you delete my comment?” is basically just begging to get banned. Yes, they deleted it. You’re a troll. Live with yourself. And if you’re not, THEY STILL DELETED IT AND YOU CAN’T GET IT BACK.
• If you can’t be at a web site without getting angry, PRESS THE BACK BUTTON.
• If you can’t be at a web site without wanting to threaten someone, PRESS THE BACK BUTTON.
• If you have been told you are no longer welcome at a web site, PRESS THE BACK BUTTON.
• If the police have taken away your computer, GO LIE DOWN. SHHHH.

If you see a troll at someone else’s website:

• Your first instinct may be to defend the web site owner from the troll. But unless they have addressed the troll and encouraged you to do the same, ignore the troll. Trolls like attention. They like conversation. Ignoring them is like cutting off their air supply.
• Do not engage in a debate with said troll if the web site owner asks you to stop. It’s like arguing with someone’s spouse on their behalf, except they’re already having make-up sex and now you’re just killing the mood.
• Do not go to the troll’s website and troll them. They will only torture you (or the owner of the web site at which you discovered them) all the more in return.
• Trolls that start out funny can get scary really fast. Keep that in mind before you wave your arms to get their attention.
• All the arguments in the world will not convince a true troll. Assume all trolls are true trolls.
• If the owner of the web site asks you to speak up on their behalf in their comments, stay reasonable, don’t threaten, and don’t match the troll’s tone. Show them that such behaviour is foreign and unwelcome at the site in question. But maybe just stick with not doing it, regardless. Encourage the site owner not to do it, too, if at all possible. You’re not going to win.
• DO NOT WRITE AN ENTRY ABOUT THE TROLL OR THEIR WEB SITE ON YOUR BLOG. You’ve given the troll their DREAM post at that point, AND you’re pouring gasoline on the fire. Or on the troll. Wait, that might be fun.
• If you see a discussion heading towards troll territory — and it can happen with perfectly decent people who get carried away — just don’t engage in it. Yes, you can say whatever you want. But no, it’s not always the right time.

If you have trolls, or fear trolls:

• I know it seems like a leap at times, but try not to write abusive things about other people, especially other people with internet access. Why be an asshole? Being an asshole on a micro level can get macro on you pretty damn fast.
• Besides — linking to people after writing abusive things about them? Makes you a troll. See above.
• A well-reasoned critique on someone else’s views is a different thing, but if they’re a nutbar? They’re going to go nutbar on you. Don’t be shocked.
• If someone makes a trollish comment, stop for a second before you respond. Did they mean to troll? Or are they confused? Some people are unable to articulate their meaning in appropriate ways, and sometimes it takes stepping back from the situation to realize that you’re dealing with overpunctuation, not rabid anger.
• Don’t put up your email address if you don’t want emails. Or at the very least, put up a Gmail address you can easily abandon — don’t send all your site mail to your main mailbox on the web.
• Don’t be afraid to delete comments or ban IP addresses. But don’t make a giant deal of it, either. Simply state in your comment policy that you will eliminate abusive commenters, and that you’ll do it at your discretion. It’s your site. It’s up to you.
• If you love arguments in your comments and you encourage people to abuse one another — or you enjoy abusing others — you’ll look silly complaining when it gets out of hand. Don’t start what you are unprepared to finish.
• Don’t tell your troll that you’re going to contact their workplace because you’ve got their IP. Want to see someone REALLY go bananas? Threaten their livelihood.
• Don’t write posts about specifically abusive commenters — again, that’s the attention they wanted.
• If you can’t get any perspective on the comments people are leaving — if you take things too personally and freak out — it’s time to either take a break, or get someone ELSE to moderate your comments for you. Or take off comments. That’s not the end of the world, either.

At the end of the day, everyone will lose their temper now and again, and write something that embarrasses them. It’s just a matter of not making it a lifestyle choice.

Yeah, you have to be tough to stick around the web for long, but sometimes that’s too much to ask — especially of people with families. Sometimes readers go too far. Most of the time, there’s no excuse.

If you’ve been an asshole, apologize, and let it go. If the person ignores you, you did your part. You can’t make them love you, as Bonnie Raitt says.

And please — for the love of all that is good and webby — remember that this is a big scary world full of horrible things.

Try not to be another scary or horrible thing.

Period.

Edit: This post is a zillion years old, guys. Check out the rest of the blog if you like. Thanks for coming by. And if your comment didn’t post (they’re now closed), you probably included some sort of profanity or sexual reference that didn’t make friends with Akismet. Or was just kind of pointlessly annoying and off-topic. Either way. :)

I think it’s time to start making some plans.

To work on some things that might not occur in the next week, but perhaps the next year.

To look ahead instead of looking at my feet, watching every tentative step.

I’m always scared to start saving for something or dreaming of something or working towards something big, because, well… who knows what might come up in the meantime?

What if the plan doesn’t work? What if it disrupts what I’m already doing? What if I’m not well enough? What if I have no resources, or I have to spend money on something more urgent and necessary? What if someone needs something from me that is more important than my own goals?

The feeling of wanting and dreaming and reaching… and then nothing.

I’ve done that. And those echoes don’t fade quickly.

But since when was that ever a real excuse?

I know I work hard at what I do and live a pretty sedate life beyond that.

I don’t take a lot of chances.

I don’t push a lot of boundaries.

I don’t ask a whole lot out of the world around me.

But I think it’s time I organized things and looked at what was possible, both in terms of setting down stronger roots, and growing my branches up towards the light of day.

I’m too young to be this resigned, and too old to think I can just “try again in a while.”

I need to try now, before I get too used to not trying at all.

When I was a little girl, I had so many dreams and daydreams about the future, and about how I intended to live my life. I had educational plans written in perfect penmanship in journals. I had house plans blocked out in crooked squares and pinned to corkboard behind my bedroom door. I had stacks of magazines full of images that seemed to add up to womanhood. I had crushes and boyfriends and notions about love that came from books and songs and movies. I had friendships that I figured would last a whole lifetime, and then some. I had lists of things I was going to do with my body and my heart and my mind.

I had everything planned out, but not really.

I just figured that anything I wanted was possible.

But somewhere along the way, I procrastinated and intimidated and vacillated and came up against obstacles I either couldn’t leap, or chose not to even tackle. And I know that I’ve disappointed myself and others with the things I didn’t do, and the things I didn’t try.

It doesn’t mean I didn’t work hard. It doesn’t mean I haven’t done anything with my time.

It just means I sold out what could have been. What should have been.

Now the clock ticking onward finally seems to have startled me out of a deep sleep, and I’ve come to realize that the stony chill of longing in the pit of my stomach is not something I have to live with forever.

I may not get it right.

I may not get it at all.

It might be too late for some things.

It’s just not too late for me.