Before the word blogging was invented (it's kind of funny to think of words being invented but they are--every year), I published by email a regular little column for my friends and family that I dubbed "L.A. Diaries."They were basically short essays, thoughts and stories about my experiences as a young fresh earnest screenwriter embarking on my career in Los Angeles.These days I'm still earnest, though perhaps not as fresh (or young!) as I once was (hopefully more knowledgeable and experienced though), and the blogsite has replaced the en masse emailing.
Though I love the technological benefits blogging gives me, I've lost something in the transition. Because of the public, aye, world-wide access posting anything on the web provides, I have found myself becoming very conscientious about mentioning particular names of people I interact with. I speak namely of the stars, those people who generate fifty-zillion Internet pages when they are googled (that's a recently invented verb).
It's not that I have anything damaging to say about any of these people (for the record, my relationships with all of them are good and those I really know are GREAT people), it's just that in a business whose daily decisions are so precariously perched on the pinnacle of public opinion that they can be swayed by a mere positive or negative breeze, I don't want to be the guy who's blowing the wrong winds. Are thousands of people reading my blog? Heck no. But it only takes one:
"Ya know this writer named Avery has told the world that he's frustrated at how slow things are moving with you."
So in trying to decide whether or not to write about this or that, I ultimately end up not writing at all. That's got to change.In fact, my whole approach to writing professionally needs to be fixed. What that entails will be the subject of my next post--unless, of course, I have a very important story meeting with Tom Hanks or Steven Spielberg to tell you about first.
I could only wish.
Avery O. Williams