#self imge

[man-of-quotations-blog]

[captainraleigh]

The Bear

I am

  A Bear

     not a girl

        brown eyes

          brown hair

                  broad shoulders

                    strong and thick

                         arms

                                legs

 I must be a Bear

         these arms

             too big for a girl

               too strong and hairy

                   not a girl

                         not a boy

                             what else is there?

  Bears must laugh

             they must love

                   they must love to hold another tight

                        to comfort

                               to cry with them

                                     to make everything better

    They must feel the stinging

         laughs

                words

                    looks of disgust

   Because if they do not

       then what am I?

[thatdidnthurtatall]

I'm someone new everyday and I still don't like her. 

[figmentpez]

Early in High School I had the horrible habit of tacking on "just kidding" every time I made a joke. It annoyed people around me, and ruined the humor most of the time. I eventually learned that I didn't have to add that, people knew I was kidding, but sometimes on the web I want to fall back into that old pattern of worrying that no one else knows I'm joking.

Not that adding "just kidding" would actually help in most cases; it'd just make me seem like more of an asshole. I guess that's the problem with trying to joke without tone of voice, and without a frame of reference. My fear then, and my fear now, is that my audience doesn't know me. I feel I have to explain that I'm joking, or not even try to joke at all, because they won't know what part I'm joking about.

Take my recent pun-filled reblog. I'm really hoping I didn't come across as some smart-ass trying to show-up someone else and look superior. To people that know me, I would hope I come across as honestly complimentary and using an exaggerated premise as framing for puns, not for any real criticism. However, I don't know how I'd come across to people who don't know me, or who only know part of me.

Which gets back to part of the rant I posted the other day. I don't know when I'm being a jerk. I mean, sometimes I know, and I certainly know when I'm intentionally being a jerk, but I don't always catch when things I say come across poorly when I mean them with good intentions. I second-guess myself enough that almost everything I say goes through so many filters and recriminations that it comes back as "that's awful, why would you say that?" in some form or fashion.