Lately, I have been pondering the concept of Legacy.
Now, Merriam-Webster defines “Legacy” as
1. a gift by will
especially of money or other personal property : bequest
2. something transmitted by or received from an
ancestor or predecessor or from the past
Given that I am currently about as broke as a joke, it’s
safe to say that it’s not so much the first definition that is captivating my
thoughts this evening. It’s #2 that is more of what I am focusing on…
Specifically, a concept of Legacy that may already exist (but if not I TOTALLY
claim it): our Internet Legacy. Ours, meaning on a microcosmic scale.
What the hell do I even mean by “Internet legacy” ? I
suppose our “Online selves and lives, as defined through various social media
tools and blogs.” There are our physical lives and selves, and then there our
online selves. A separate identity, most often. Perhaps a reflection of only
certain fragments. Perhaps only the edited version. But still, a version
nonetheless. A record.
A legacy.
I’ve maintained an online version of myself—sometimes
several—in a desultory fashion since the late summer of 2001. LiveJournal was
my vehicle for expression for a decent bit of time, up until about 2006. Then I
graduated and moved, and began blogging via wordpress and blogger, and MySpace
and Facebook happened. And then YouTube and Twitter and Instagram and so on and
so on and so on.
Looking back, I suppose my Internet legacy is like my real legacy—scattered,
messy, unfocused. There have been a few reasons for this plaguing me throughout
the years: first, a self-consciousness that I can’t quite shake; the feeling
that my words are inconsequential, prosaic, and even pompous-sounding. Second,
a fear that one day I might “live out loud” too much, say the wrong thing, and
get myself into hot water at work or damage future job prospects. So to remedy
the first, every now and then I would “transform” my online self by taking on a
new blog platform or handle. (Incidentally, I’m totally old enough now to know
that moving your digs doesn’t change your identity, but it also totally doesn’t
stop me from trying.) To remedy the second, I have gone to convoluted and
probably ineffective lengths to not specify where I work, to not disclose my
last name, so on and so forth. For a lot
of reasons, I don’t think that works too well.
I find myself, once more, at a crossroads in my Online Life.
(Perhaps, because I am at a crossroads in my Real Life as well?) I don’t want
to abandon my Online Legacy—countless times I have found myself blessing Past
Me for documenting what I thought was quotidian and boring nonsense—but at the
same time, I do want to clean it up, transform it, get it focused and launched
on the road that I want it to be on.
Maybe it means going back to basics—going back to where it
all started.