Last night my little friends and I went to hear a talk at the student center by the man who started PostSecret, I hadn't really heard of it before hand (sounds like a deoderant) and I was just like "oh, people mail him secrets, how fun, and sometimes they probably make them up and it's kind of like Found Magazine!" So it was weird to start with because we were surrounded by undergrads (and I know, I know, some of my best friends are undergrads, but undergrads at Covenant aren't so much undergrads because there is no grad school, we are the real students at Covenant. And I know there are probably decent kids here, too, but I think most of the ones last night were just there because of the All American Rejects song "Dirty Little Secret", which apparently used some of these "secrets" in its music video.) Anyway, the man started talking and it was like instant awkwardness, although I couldn't put my finger on why I felt that way for awhile. At the beginning all I knew was that it reminded me of being in chapel. A man was on stage, talking to me informally, but preaching just the same, trying to give me meaning in my life. I didn't want meaning, I wanted to hear the funny stories. I was quite surprised to hear how seriously he took everything, and I realized that my awkwardness came from the fact that he was completely up front, there was no irony, no cynicism, and no guard. Which is kind of like exposing yourself in public. I appreciate nudity, but it's still weird when it's in front of a crowd of people. The secrets, too, I was expecting something else, they read like Hallmark cards, bad Hallmark cards, and everyone says the same thing "I'm insecure" "I don't like myself" "I cry while having sex" (okay, all of them don't say that, but you get the idea). Now I don't know why I like this, but I can't take that, but they're different in my mind. So we got through the heartwarmingness and the emo-ness and it all just seemed very preachy. The man was like, look secrets, now I'm going to tell you what to get out of it. And I believe in the wholeness of humanity and the need to know other people, yes, yes I do, probably more than he does, but I don't think this is the way to get it.
Afterwards my roommate and I were talking about the whole idea of it, people giving secrets to someone they don't know and will never know. She pointed out that people have been doing this for years, it's called Confession. I said I didn't like it for kind of the same reasons I feel weird about Confession. Why are these people giving their secrets to strangers; where are their friends and families? The man talked about how this is helping us to realize the humanness of people, how we are all the same and all in this together. I think that is so important, and that's why I love the Christopher Harold Cleveland Game and all of those Sunday afternoons in the Tower Room when we would talk about God and our lives and each other and we would realize we were all human and all in this together and hey, God exists. But I think we should talk about it, not tell secrets about it.
Posted by linnea at February 28, 2007 4:01 PM