a good buddy of mine posed an interesting question this evening, and one that is more relevant today than it ever has been before – “(do) you think a couple should be so open that they would share their e-mail accounts. Or do you think that couples should be allowed a little bit of privacy as long as they aren't hiding things?”

i think that there are two schools of thought in this matter.  the first, and i would guess the more prevalent, would prescribe that an individual indeed has the right to privacy in certain matters and that for the good of the individual, and possibly for the spouse, that privacy should be respected, and mutually so.  in other words, everyone needs a certain bit of private space in which to be themselves, to relax their guard, and to protect their own interests (or in some cases, secrets).  now, this is not to say that individuals in a trusting relationship will necessarily use this privacy to have affairs, court other people, or plan to kill state leaders, but they might legitimately use this space to cultivate their private interests that their spouse might not share, pursue friendships that might make the spouse uncomfortable (e.g. with ex-partners, close friends, enemies of the spouse, etc.), or to plan to kill state leaders.  in such cases, the respect of a person’s privacy is manifestly an expression of trust.  if a person really trusts someone, then having access to an email account is both inessential and inconsequential.  if a person does not completely trust someone, then that trust needs to be re-established, and that can be a very very challenging task.

the second school of thought, one to which i happen to belong, and which i think necessitates a particular and uncommon level of comfort with one’s self and one’s history, is to allow full, unimpeded access to one’s present, past and future.  for a very small subset of the population, full disclosure poses no significant problem, because either they are confident that the choices that they have made, are making, or will make, correctly and consistently reflect their individual values and personality.  or they just don’t care enough to veil their motivations.  i am often asked why/how/am i insane to put the kind of personal information i put on my blog – and i think that the reasons are the same.  if i have keep no secrets, then my secrets can never be used against me.  as this relates to relationships, if someone that i care about cannot recognize that i come with louis vuitton’s worth of baggage (as someone once commented of me), and doesn’t approve of that particular brand of baggage, then there’s a deeper problem than that person is reading my email without my approval.

everybody does things that they regret.  everybody does things that they wish they could take back.  but everything that anyone does goes into forming the character of that person in the next day, and gives them a chance to improve upon what they have been.  looking too much at the past and what was said or written long ago and pulling that past into the present is something that the reader does at their own risk – heaven knows i’ve learned that lesson the hard way.  the real trick in this problem is to keep things in perspective – to recognize that whatever was written or thought or felt in the past… was in the past. 

like angela bassett says in strange days… “memories are meant to fade – they’re designed that way for a reason.”

- g

song of the day for reminiscing about the past – nothing really matters, madonna (the epileptic geisha)