The Dev. Director must have provided the information for that timeline because no one would remember all those details unless they were a stalker or a parent. It's a cute idea, but I don't know about mentioning the exes. That can open a big can of worms.
His mom does personal scrapbooks for everyone in the family... and every Christmas sends out a survey asking everyone's stats/changes/news/etc and maps out all those changes for everyone.
I had to do a 20-year govt background check and I couldn't even REMEMBER THE NAME of some of the companies I had worked for. Honestly.. I could use this kind of timeline just for paperwork!
That's another aspect of it... not only your experience of sharing your own intimate timeline in an unfiltered way... but of how that information that is important but also private or mundane (and therefore generally forgotten or not contextualized) is where a lot of the interesting stories are that we DON'T know .. or don't understand... because we don't even know how to ask about that stuff we don't know....about our loved ones.
How much we lose when we don't know our family well... even though those are the people you're "supposed to know" the best.
so interesting! My gut reaction to the prospect of sharing my intimate history... is horror and shame. That seems very telling. I have a lot more pride for who I am now, than for who I used to be.
I think MOST people's would be horror/shame, honestly.
I thought he was BOLD to do so. To be so accepting of his story... that he would share it so openly. Not with pride, but with... radical acceptance.
The good right alongside the bad. The interesting alongside the mundane.
When you read it... it WAS a story. Breakups and moving and changing jobs... all clustering, you can see... when things were full of change.. and see when things settled down. What worked for him. And what didn't.
It was so... direct. I loved it.
But I would be so tempted to edit it... the same way I am tempted to edit this journal, sometimes.
I'm boring. I have no exes. Back when single, no one asked me out, so there was no break-up. Finally, Ray asked me out - and we eventually we married. Then I stayed married. Never cheated. Never divorced. Same religion. Nothing alternative. Lived in the same town from 1949 (when I was born) to 1971, when I was married, then in another town from 1971 until now. Add Hilton Head as a second residence. No jobs except for summer jobs before marriage. Ok -- more than a few volunteer positions. Just one child, and now a grandchild.
Yikes! I'm more embarrassed about how bland my life has been than if I'd added more spice. People would look at me as a "nothing burger" if they saw my timeline.
But - I keep this journal in all its nothingness, and people read it. I think! 🙃 I also don't advertise this journal to Real Life friends/family. I'm truthful - maybe too truthful here. My real life is also truthful but with omissions (which are here). Kinda sad.
To me, it just looks like you'd have more room on your timeline to talk about travel and interests and friends, rather than all that space being taken up with 6-month boyfriends from when you were 16 and moving every other year!
Ain't nothing wrong with that!
In fact, that's probably why people read what you share! And also... because you are being truthful... even maybe "too truthful". You don't have to be spicy to be complex or interesting. At least that's what *I* look for in a good journal, person, book, and/or meal!
I don’t think it’s bland, I think it’s just that your details would be different than his: no breakups, no vasectomy, but other factors would come up instead.
This is a really interesting idea, and i have to echo others that it would be tough for me to put together one for myself that gets much deeper than what is on my LinkedIn. Even if i were to read through all my old LiveJournal entries, there were plenty of important things i never wrote about here, or wrote about only long afterwards
( ... )
I was really thinking about IRL social privacy.... but you bring up a good point when it comes to digital privacy and how there are probably IS a big file of this information about us.... EXCEPT we don't even have access OR control over it... and although *we could* use that information about ourselves to help us map and inform our lives, but instead our information is kept private.. FROM US... like, the people's whose information it *is*.... and then on top of that, it's MOSTLY used for personality-profiling us for marketing purposes. Double gross.
Yeah, I agree... imagine if we had access to our records so easily, and ALSO the opportunity to exert control over who had them!
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I had to do a 20-year govt background check and I couldn't even REMEMBER THE NAME of some of the companies I had worked for. Honestly.. I could use this kind of timeline just for paperwork!
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Would have LOVED such intimate timelines for my parents. They kept a lot to themselves, and now aren't around to ask any more.
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How much we lose when we don't know our family well... even though those are the people you're "supposed to know" the best.
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My gut reaction to the prospect of sharing my intimate history... is horror and shame.
That seems very telling.
I have a lot more pride for who I am now, than for who I used to be.
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I thought he was BOLD to do so.
To be so accepting of his story... that he would share it so openly.
Not with pride, but with... radical acceptance.
The good right alongside the bad.
The interesting alongside the mundane.
When you read it... it WAS a story.
Breakups and moving and changing jobs... all clustering, you can see... when things were full of change.. and see when things settled down.
What worked for him.
And what didn't.
It was so... direct. I loved it.
But I would be so tempted to edit it...
the same way I am tempted to edit this journal, sometimes.
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Yikes! I'm more embarrassed about how bland my life has been than if I'd added more spice. People would look at me as a "nothing burger" if they saw my timeline.
But - I keep this journal in all its nothingness, and people read it. I think! 🙃 I also don't advertise this journal to Real Life friends/family. I'm truthful - maybe too truthful here. My real life is also truthful but with omissions (which are here). Kinda sad.
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Ain't nothing wrong with that!
In fact, that's probably why people read what you share!
And also... because you are being truthful... even maybe "too truthful".
You don't have to be spicy to be complex or interesting. At least that's what *I* look for in a good journal, person, book, and/or meal!
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Yeah, I agree... imagine if we had access to our records so easily, and ALSO the opportunity to exert control over who had them!
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