Tuesday 1 March 2005

Pic of the day: Vampire from the anime Tsukuyomi Moon Phase. They are cute when they are small, aren't they? But I'm not talking about that kind of vampires (or anime, though it sure can suck too).

Time vampires

I am introverted by nature, but not shy. As a kid I loved going to the blackboard, and in college I would help out with the teaching when appropriate. When I'm in a group of strangers that have come together for some purpose, I tend to take charge, get to know people and get people to know each other. I may perhaps come across as a kind of leader type briefly, but in the end I always end up the outsider. This is as it should be, since I am so different. But it has hardly anything to do with ordinary shyness. Perhaps extraordinary shyness... ^_^

I can talk to people. I can talk to thousands of people if it seems appropriate, although that has only happened very rarely and very briefly. It is not something I relish. You see, if you talk to ten thousand people for one minute, you consume almost exactly 1 week of human lifetime! That is an awesome responsibility.

***

The same applies if you write a book. If it is read by thousands, you could easily take charge of YEARS of human lifetime. If I were to do that, I would need to be convinced that I really had something to say. If I was doing it only for fame, I would be a vampire really: Sucking other people's life to feed my ego. Just without the dribbling mess.

Now you may say, "From what I know of people, they don't hold that time very precious anyway. If they have free time, you're most likely to find them killing it." I would be inclined to agree with you. But, and perhaps this is hubris and will be punished someday, but I like to think that I hold myself to higher standards when it comes to other peoples' time. They may squander their time and I may squander mine, but ... I mean, it is one thing if I break my own dinner plate, but far more dramatic if I break even a friend's dinner plate. (I am sure some people think quite the opposite, as long as they are not required to pay for their friend's plate, but I don't respect that in people and I like to respect myself at least slightly.)

So the short of it is: If I don't have anything to say, I don't want to say it to a lot of people. And at the very least, I don't want to do so under false pretenses.