4/13/00
If you're going to spend any significant amount of time reading The Devil You Know, you should read this sooner or later. It's the "caveat emptor" part. (Or call it a Mission Statement, if you like.)
First - I'm a moody guy. (I've been described by more than one ex-girlfriend as "the moody artist type.") I have frequent bouts with severe depression and anxiety. At the time I started The Devil You Know I also started treatment for this depression and anxiety through medication and therapy (as well as acupuncture, bodywork and other holistic methods). It's important to me that I get well.
That said - I'm given to expressing my own darkness when I feel it. A lot of it's bound to come through in these pages. If that bothers you, go read a funnier journal, like Pamie's or Dana's.
(I also tend to go on at great length. Frequently. This page is probably one of the shortest in the whole damn journal. That's what I get for keeping silent for so many years - the dam doesn't just burst, it explodes.)
Second - a lot of the web journalists I read draw pretty strict boundaries about what they're going to write about - no sex life, no close friends, no work, no mood swings, etc. I admire these folks for their discipline and their compartmentalization.
I don't compartmentalize. Never have successfully. Everything is related in my view, part of a big web of happenings and beingness (fuzzy enough for you?) Everything conceivably has an effect on everything else.
Plus I've never kept a journal before, so I don't know what's likely to show up in it. But I'm not going to draw any boundaries about what I consider fit subject matter at this point. That's just too limiting right now. I may feel differently later on.
Although: if you hope to find juicy, exquisitely detailed information about my sex life - don't hold your breath. I have yet to feel comfortable writing in-depth about sex - whether it's me or someone else having it - even in an obviously fictional setting. I'm old-fashioned enough to start blushing when I talk about it with my friends… and I doubt even the (relative) anonymity of the Web will guarantee me a blush-free journaling future.
Third - even though I don't write about sex in juicy detail, I do write about it some. So if sexual situations, or for that matter rough language, make you uncomfortable, there are plenty of other journals that you can read that are more delicate.
TO MY FAMILY: You probably won't even see this in the first place, not being Web-oriented types. And if you do, you won't find much about yourselves in here; we're not a close family and I don't have a lot of day-to-day dealings with you. If you do find your way here and are contemplating reading this journal, please be aware that you may find out some stuff about me, and about my view of our shared history, that you didn't know. If that doesn't bother you, then read on. But if you don't like what you read, I don't want to hear about it.
TO MY FRIENDS: Read if you must. If you appear in The Devil You Know, I've given you an alias but if you read long enough, you - and others we know - will be identifiable eventually. And you may find out some stuff - about me, about what I think, about what I do - that you didn't know; and chances are good that sooner or later you'll find that you'd rather have kept it that way. Over the years I've developed the habit of not committing my most critical or negative thoughts to any sort of public medium - a habit I'm slowly eroding in the interest of becoming a more open person. Some of that erosion appears in The Devil You Know. In any case, a lot of what I truly think about you, me, and the life we share is bound to seep through in between the words - good, bad and ugly alike. If you want to keep reading after knowing that - it's your choice. But if you choose to keep reading, please let me know.
TO EVERYONE ELSE: Enjoy. Please.
