Turns out, I have many secrets. This blog, for one. The salacious email affair I'm conducting, for another. Being on my own as I am, I never stopped to think about these secrets that I keep. It's me and me only, so what's to notice?
The breadth and depth of my secrecy came crashing in the other day when my father suddenly appeared on my doorstep and announced that he was "there to fix [my] computer."
Uh oh.
I protested verily, declaring "No need!" and "Really! It's fine!" but he was not to be deterred. He marched himself into my office, sat himself down in my chair, and began clicking all over the place in an effort to discover why my home computer was so snail-ass slow. I stood over his shoulder, willing him NOT to click on the folder named "New Folder." For in this folder? Things of a personal nature. Things of a *ahem!* photographic, personal nature.
Not the things you'd want your father to see.
Yes, people. I admit it. I have a wee small naughty streak in me. (And I have the pictures to prove it *wink wink*)
And this got me to thinking... If I were to die suddenly and my family were to go through my personal effects, what would they learn about me? What things would I NOT want them to see/read/touch/know about? So I began making a list in my head... and that list got long. Very long.
I need a buddy that knows of my naughtiness so that, in the event of my death, they can run over to my house and clear out all of my badness before my parents find out I wasn't as innocent as they'd like to believe. But that would require SHARING the badness and I just don't know how to go about that. My friends are close, but I don't think I'd be comfortable calling any of them up and saying, "Hey friend! In the event of my death, please get on my computer and delete the New Folder full of evocative and lascivious photographs. And also, in my closet, there's a box of old letters from The Ex. Burn those, please. Also, you'll need to check my secret email account and delete all of the messages in there, too. DON'T READ THEM. And you might want to check my nightstand. And the top drawer of my dresser."
And that's the problem right there. Once you bring someone into the naughty fold, you have to explain yourself and really, who wants to do that? What's more, SHARING the naughtiness makes it less naughty. It's the secrecy that makes it alluring.
So what do you do? Do you resign yourself to the fact that people will learn you're not as pure as the driven snow? Do you accept that you won't really care because, hey, you're dead?
It's a puzzler.
The Fifth of July
16 hours ago
13 comments:
Oh, you make me laugh!!! I was thinking JUST the same thing as I was contemplating rolling over and getting up this morning. I mean, if I croaked, how would the internet know of my demise, since no one I really know, knows about my blog? Would you all just assume that I was on a long, long vacation? And my porn collection? Oh, internets. You are the only ones that know of that. And the journals? Ack.
If what you leave behind reads as well as your posts, I think people will be more delighted by your... um... secrets... than disturbed by them.
Or you could just seal everything in water-pressure-proof time capsules, dump them in the ocean, and entertain future generations of highly evolved sea creatures.
Umm, why don't you just make "New Folders" a hidden directory?
Why does Malaise have to be all practical like that? I mean, seriously. A solution? Hahaha! And agreed. If I am gone from blogging for more than 21 days *without notice* then you can assume I have croaked, am hiding from the law, living it up in Fiji or have gone back to drinking. Only one of which sounds even remotely tempting. (That would be Fiji, in case you were worried....)
Well now! This has only served to make you all the more interesting!
By the way, you're parents have a naughty streak too and they don't want you to know about it.
kate - Maybe we need to create a standard blogger rule that, should a blogger disappear without notice for 21 days or more, it is accepted that the blogger has either 1) perished; 2) committed or witnessed a heinous crime and is on the lam; or 3) run off to Fiji and is Living The Dream.
If you disappear - Fiji or whatever - I'll cry. And also come to South Dakota and hunt your ass down.
[f]oxymoron - *laughing* I don't know if they read like my posts. And the pictures? That's more of me than the world needs to see.
malaise - Interesting. "Hidden directory." I knew naught of the hidden directory. What if I hide it and then can't find it again?
brianalt - Why thank you! *grin* And I believe you're right... My parents held a ceremony in the backyard several years ago in which they burned a bunch of letters they had written eachother when my dad was in the military. We, the children, were upset because we wanted to see them. My mother told us, "NO WAY. Those letters were explicit." Way to go mama!
this is like that one episode of 'the unit' where that one special ops guy dies and then bob goes to clear out his locker and finds his burn box that says DESTROY IF I DIE. bob destroys the contents of the box like a good solider. he didn't even look inside! so if you could like, collect all your secrets and put them in one place and then write instructions on the outside and then tell a few select peeps, maybe you'd be so lucky. and maybe you could, like, password protect or encrypt the New Folder? or go so far as to get an external hard drive, put the secret shame on said HD, and then put the HD in said burn box?
HAHAHAH YOU ARE HILARIOUS! WOW!
What if I hide it and then can't find it again?
Microsoft is thinking of you. Bring up Windows Explorer (right click your start button and choose "Explore". Go to "Tools" and then "Folder Options". On the View tab of the dialog box, you will find white box with a bunch of selectable options. One of those options allows you to show hidden files and folders.
Yeah, I know. But, Bill Gates is the richest man in the world. Far be it for us to question him.
The BFF gets custody of my computer and all my writing when I die. I trust her implicitly and know that she will get rid of or hide anything that would cause my family distress :D
"Pure as the driven snow." Bah. You've driven in snow. Did it look pure to you? Not even.
I think probably nobody is quite what they appear to be, and the trick is to try and live as close on the surface to who you are underneath.
I'm not eager for someone to rummage through my things when I'm gone, but I try to live such that those things would not surprise anybody much; it's much easier to just live without secrets! (Not, I understand, that this is always possible...)
I am totally there for you. I mean, I'm close and totally trustworthy. So long as I can, you know, get a preview.
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