Filed under: My name is Carin Dupin
Hi, my name is carin dupin and welcome to Personne.
I feel like I did when I was in grade 3 standing for the first (and last!) time on the school stage about to read a poem I had written (it was parents night so ALL the parents were there) and because of the bright lights I couldn’t see anyone in the audience but I could hear them breathing and squirming in their chairs and clearing their throats as they sat waiting to hear me make a fool of myself. It was too much. I peed in my underwear and walked off without reading my poem. I went home and burned the poem and swore never to step foot on a stage again. Until today.
I know this isn’t the same as a real stage but it feels like a stage. It’s me alone speaking (writing) in a public place. And it’s not a small stage in a small school in a small town. It’s the World Wide Web which makes me think of spiders. I use to be terrified of spiders. I’m not so terrified anymore. Freud said that arachnophobia is a fear of being devoured by the mother. I’ve spent most of my life being afraid of mothers. My mother was always trying to devour me. I never felt that I was good enough. If Freud is right than that is most likely why I peed in my underwear. I knew that somewhere out there beyond the lights in the blackness was my mother sitting there like a spider waiting for the moment when I got myself all tangled in her web of crooked love. If you knew a spider was about to eat you I think you might pee in your underwear too! That is why I have decided to do this. To get over my fear of being eaten. So far so good! At least I haven’t peed in my underwear yet. That may be because I can’t hear you breathing.
I’m not in the habit of making New Year’s resolutions. I think it is because I tend to make resolutions every morning which I break before night fall. New Year’s day is just another day, another chance to resolve to do something that I’ll stop doing by the end of the day. But this year for reasons that aren’t yet clear to me I decided to make a New Year resolution. The thing is that I didn’t make my decision on New Year’s Day, I made it on the Chinese New Year instead. Since this is the year of the Ox and I have a tendency to be bull-headed it felt appropriate. I made two resolutions: to live more joy and to start blogging. One reason I like the idea of a New Year resolution is that it gives me a whole year to pull off the resolve instead of only a day. I resolved to blog to see if I could stand on a stage without making a fool of myself and I resolved to live more joy because I have never been very good at enjoying my life. I believe that the key to life is joy and not being afraid of anything, including spiders! If I meet someone who is full of joy and not afraid of anything I feel like I’m meeting someone who is really alive. I think if I had more joy in my life I would be a better human being. I tend to take things far too seriously! I think anyone who has ever known me would agree. And I believe if I can manage to be less serious I will no longer pee in my underwear.
My good friend D has been urging me to blog for a long time. Whenever he said the word blog it didn’t ‘sound’ like a very pleasant thing for one friend to urge another friend to do but I knew his intentions were good. A while back D’s very good friend Mo created this blog for him. It was Mo who came up with the name Personne. After making one post to the blog D ran out of things to write. When I told him about my resolution he told me that he wanted me to have his blog. I hope Mo doesn’t mind? D has this way of getting me to do things that I don’t think I want to do but then when I do them I realize that he was right.
The word ‘blog’ is so ugly it’s beautiful! The name comes from Joe Bloggs (c.1969) and was British slang for “any hypothetical person” an equivalent of Joe Blow. In a way that’s perfect given that my blog is called Personne. That means that I’m a hypothetical person. I may or may not exist. I like that. I suppose you will never know for sure!
Hi, my name is Carin Bloggs and this is Personne.
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Personne 
I don’t mind at all! I am delighted to find these posts. Keep blogging, it’s a wonderful exercise in alternate thought processes. And you are extremely perceptive; I actually do lead a secret life, and don’t actually live my life openly on my blog. I even have an anonymous blog out there about other things that I could never blog about at benigngirl.
I would be happy to add you to my subscription list, which is an email alert with little bits that are overwhelming and private and could never be in my blog.
I was happy to get this google alert for a link to benigngirl. Thanks so much. I quite like you, I can tell.
XO, hello, and you go!,
Comment by Mo February 16, 2009 @ 10:08Mo
i am relieved that you don’t mind but i really didn’t think you would be. i like the way you say alternate thought process. that’s so true! i think everyone lives a secret life don’t you? but not everyone knows how to have fun with it. i am fascinated by how and where and when we chose to expose parts of ourselves. when i was younger i wanted so bad to sneak into the confessional in the catholic church to hear the things people would say to the priest that they wouldn’t say to anyone else. i didn’t have the nerve but i would sit in the church looking at people as they went into the confessional dying to know what they were about to confess.
thank you for offering to add me to your subscription list. i would like that very much. i don’t know how one goes about inviting others to read one’s blog. do you have a suggestion?
thank you Mo.
xocarin
Comment by sapientiadei February 16, 2009 @ 11:19Hi Carin,
I just wanted to drop you a quick note and let you know that I am really enjoying your Blog. I can totally relate to being to serious and needing more joy in life. How is your resolution working out?
So far, I have only had the chance to read your 3 part series on money (which is awesome) and this one, but I’ll be back for more.
Have a great day!
Rick
PS. Are you still writing?
Comment by Rick November 30, 2009 @ 12:30Dear Rick
Thank you for your comments. They do mean a lot to me and make me want to begin posting again. Yes I am still writing. Every day. It’s not good for the rent but I am happier. As for the being too serious, yes and no; it feels like an evolution. I feel like I am less serious about the things that are less important and more serious about the things that are. And I do feel like I am being more serious about feeling joy. That’s an improvement I think. But I have not done too well on the resolution to blog. There is still time!
be well
Comment by carin November 30, 2009 @ 14:09Carin
Hi Carin,
Yes! There is still lot’s of time, so keep on blogging! 🙂
Besides your resolution, I bet many people connect with your words, experiences and humor, even if they don’t leave a comment 😉
So far it is true, happiness doesn’t pay the rent, but I full heartedly agree with your choice of happiness over the money! Although, I am challenged with existephobia and money as well, so the word “choice” doesn’t really apply, but I guess we do have one … lol
And yet, somewhere inside I have this unshakable feeling that the physical world is not supposed to be so restrictive. Only sacrifice and hardship warrants love, happiness or money?
I think not …
I have spent the last few years budding the visionary and the dreamer within. Drawn a line _____ between the realist and I; there is no going back. Some call me irrational, mad, or at the very least foolish. Others share some words of encouragement and admiration. But for now, the magical wonder of it all remains just a feeling, somewhere in the space between a guess and creative harmony. 🙂
Have a great day!
Comment by Rick December 2, 2009 @ 15:06Rick
Thank you again for your encouragement. Feeling that we are part of a community is so essential I feel. We need to feel related somehow to others, that the meaning of our life is somehow related to the meaning in the lives of others, even if only precariously.
I think happiness does pay the rent and that is the great and wonderful paradox. As you are indicating when you speak of our restrictive relationship to the physical world, I really believe that if we focus on honoring what is highest and best within ourselves that then and only then will all genuine needs be fulfilled. I know that whenever I stop counting (someone once said that we are a culture of counters!) when I stop trying to figure out how, I will find the necessary means, that life just takes care of itself. But that’s not what we are taught right? We think it is all up to us but it isn’t and I firmly believe that abundance comes when we surrender to our highest calling. Of course abundance may not always be what we thought it should be. For instance I don’t have much money but I have a fortune in time. Not many people with a lot of money have as much time as I do.
I think you should go on budding the visionary and dreamer. That is so beautiful and right, even if others around you don’t always understand. In terms of status quo thinking it is madness, it’s insane but I think that all poets and visionaries are insane. They need to be otherwise they would never see what they see. We cannot know what we don’t know until we let go completely of everything we think we know. I just finished reading again St John of the Cross’s ‘Dark Night of the Soul.’ Have you read it? It’s amazing. A blueprint for visionaries and dreamers, showing how being a pioneer of the spirit is never easy but the rewards are great. Go for it. That is why we are here.
I wish you well.
Carin
“Men [& women] are so necessarily mad that not to be mad would amount to another form of madness.” –Pascal
Comment by carin December 3, 2009 @ 14:38It is a pity that you no longer write the blog, Carin. I just read all the entries and much of what I write speaks to my heart. Thank you anyway.
Comment by V. October 5, 2013 @ 14:36thank you. i keep toying with the idea of writing more for the blog but keep getting distracted by other projects. be well. c
Comment by carin October 5, 2013 @ 21:37Carin, there were a mistake in my recent comment; it meant to be: much of what YOU write speaks to my heart. I’m sorry. Strange things happen. Anyway, please know you have another appreciative and yes, somewhat absent-minded introvert reader 🙂
Comment by V. October 6, 2013 @ 15:10no problem. i understood. nonetheless an interesting slip don’t you think?
Comment by carin October 6, 2013 @ 15:15Indeed. I probably was so absorbed with what you wrote that I assigned unconsciously (slips are always unconscious as we well know) your writings as my own… And there go those little three dots, of course.
Comment by V. October 6, 2013 @ 15:32