art or not

hi. my name is jewels (hi jewels) and i am a word snob.

an editor lives in my brain. she corrects or approves everything i hear & read from the latest oprah novel to the menu at Chili's. i proof-read junk mail. i find mistakes all the time. i take my liberties with punctuation; capitalization and the occasional incorrect word usage, but it is for EFFECT. i misuse because i know the correct usage and want you to be dazzled by my quirkiness. dazzled yet?

however. the average jane can't spell or write her way out of a myspace page. usage is pathetic and spelling is a freaking joke.

which brings us to our blog...

for purposes of this blog, the term "writing" refers to the art of stringing words together in a creative, effective and inventive way. it does not mean writing in the benign definition of putting letters into words on paper and/or another source of material onto which one may write.
so: "writing" means a form of craft. not just scribbling stuff to say.
Writing: What Counts?

1) is texting writing?
i am a mad, crazy texter. love the texting. with hurricane hysteria at it's peak the past few days, texting has been the most efficient way to communicate. i know you've got limited space in the text communicae, but seriously people--don't abbreviate things to the point of confusion. my guy is the king of the too little text. he sent me a typical text yesterday. all the screen said was "b". now, (and this is the really scary part), because i'm so used to his crazy abbreviations, i knew that he meant "beer."

I, on the other hand, (depending on the potential impact of the text) will take half a morning to work out exactly what i want to say in a text, saving it in the draft-box to come back and tweak it until i feel ready to send it out like a little bird to it's intended phone.

here's what i sent him back : "hv i ever told you ur text shorthand mks me crzy? i taped news 4u. purple cow not good." the purple cow was a beach-side cafe where we had a first breakfast-date...ike ate there. now it's gone. i try to use just the right sprinkle of shorthand with words-you-can-use to relay my message. in a related note, i've been tweakin a breezy, break-up text to him all morning--still sits in the draftbox. just can't decide where on the tacky scale a text break-up might fall... internet, is the text blow off classless and unacceptable... ? comment please.

for me: texting is not writing. but it should be readable.

2) is blogging writing?
if you're sitting there reading this, you probably think that blogging is writing. i think blogging is writing, but there is a line. and being the novice blogger that i am, i'm not sure where the line becomes too bold to cross. i'm speaking, my anonymous internet readers, about editing.the red-penciled lady that sits at a desk in my head, reading and marking up everything.a million times.

* once i post it, can i still edit; then repost? ?tacky scale level?i'm a quick turn-around blogger. i get a thought, maybe have a few pictures in my mind to wrap words around and i shoot. but then, a few days (or hours, or minutes or months) after i hit -Publish Post- i start to dissect it. tighten it up. 

so,

* what is the rule on pulling down a post?

i would think that once it's out there, it's out there. especially after you have comments, or at least know it's been read. you can't unring a bell. you can't unshoot a bullet. you can't pull down a crappy post.or one that blew up in your face. or can you? it kind of feels like cheating somehow.chickening out. i'm no yella-belly. but then again, i didn't know he'd be my boyfriend. i thought he was just a date with a good blog on his head.and "hurricane chubby" might be a little dirty for the oldsters in my audience checking on my IKE coverage. maybe i should edit. or maybe i shouldn't. is blogging writing? yes.no. sometimes.

3) are emails writing?

personally, this is a definite yes. i don't care if you're responding via your blackberry, take 5 seconds to spell "the" correctly. i have conducted intimate and semi-successful relationships based in totality on emails (see singapore). a well-written email can be every bit as effective as a touching hand-penned letter. emails are the written correspondence of the modern age. i know handwritten thank you notes are the gold standard, but think about it: a well-worded and sincere thanks in your inbox means as much as one found in your mail box. and be honest, how often do you check that mailbox compared with your inbox. i would like to go on record at this point firmly against the "touching" email that plays kerplunkety music with pictures of dogs wearing sunglasses and kittens hanging off of tree branches with a cute look on their face. but i don't shoot off emails flippantly. (that'll blow up on you. i promise). one of the 73,456 things my divorce taught me was, don't pop off pissed off emails. it feels anonymous, you feel sheltered and strong, but words have power. and like a tattoo, emails never go away. it there. someone's got it somewhere. and chances are, if you pissed him off enough (or her) it's printed.and in a file.in her attorney's leather bag. email is writing. sucker.