I've remarked upon this before but it bears mentioning again: Time seems to pass at a slower ace here in the Grand Canyon. Likely it's due to the relative remoteness of this location, or the fact that I don't have a TV to keep me abreast of daily happenings. But when you live here it's not uncommon to completely lose track of which day it is. Living in larger cities certain days had their distinct 'feel'; Monday felt like you had a Vise-Grip clamped around your head, while Friday and Saturday felt like the Grip had been released. In the GC one day feels pretty much like every other day: Bland and immobile in its passage. Difficult to say what accounts for this chronological phenomenon ... Maybe it has to do with the very timelessness of the Canyon itself.
Looking back over this course of this blog it's evident how m. intermittent my entries have become. There are a few reasons for this, actually. Admittedly, I'm not as desperate now as I was in 2011 when I started to chronicle my struggles with homelessness and my attempts to regain a 'normal' life. If you believe that desperation breeds creativity then you likely buy the idea that comfort breeds complacency. I expect you can make the argument for or against that idea. Probably more the case that I've gotten settled into a routine and have been either too preoccupied or too lazy to make regular updates to this blog.
Another reason is less airy and perhaps complimentary after a fashion. It seems that several of my fellow employees here in the GC have actually been reading this damn thing. Yes, it seems that Your Humble Narrator has garnered a few new recruits to this blog. I usually post updates via Facebook more out of habit than the expectation that anyone will actually follow the link. To my surprise, a few co-workers (including a manager where I work) remarked to me that they had read this blog; one had seen the link on FB after all, and told a few other people -- never discount the power of word of mouth, I guess.
I felt a flush of pride when told they enjoyed reading the entries here. A few asked me confidentially if all these events had really occurred (they did) and how I managed to turn things around (still a work in progress to be honest). I'll admit I briefly had visions of myself reading accounts of this blog to a rapt audience in some theater (off-Broadway in NYC if you really want to know). But a manager said something that broke my literary fantasy: "Hey, you're not gonna write any shit about ME in that fuckin' blog of yours, right?"
While he said it in an amiable manner, the remark did raise a few flags: If co-workers are actually reading this thing, then I'll have to be much more selective about the events I choose to relate here. That means carefully editing locations, people, events, occurrences (and attendant dates/times), etc. so as to ensure as much anonymity as possible. While I might be overreacting, I'm very much aware of how people have sealed their fates by relating too much information(personal, professional, etc) online. Indeed, I know of a few folks here who were fired after managers saw postings on Facebook (and other online forums) concerning how much weed they smoked before going to work in the park. (One genius even posted pics of his custom-made bong collection. I'm tempted to say that worker's career went up in smoke ... but I won't.)
I'd like to believe I'm a bit more circumspect that that. Still, I prefer to err on the side of caution, which is why my productivity has waned over the past few months. Rest assured, I'm still recording my day to day activities and dutifully logging daily events. But most of that is being transcribed offline. Hopefully I can manage to relate more stories by creatively editing names, events and circumstances to the point of overall anonymity. It might make for storytelling that seems a bit generic by contrast but at least the stories can be related to my readers.
And for any co-workers who might be reading this, allow me to paraphrase the announcer on Dragnet: The story you're reading is true. The names have been changed to protect the innocent -- and Your Humble Narrator!
