OD Survey

1) What does your online diary name mean, and why did you pick it?
I was pretty depressed and twisted when I started this diary. I needed something that showed that. I played around with mixing various words showing both death and life. For whatever reason Bleeding*Star worked in my brain. Most favs know me as Rory, which is actually a pen name. Its in reference to the Gilmore Girls, as my life used to slightly mirror the show. My friend was Lane and I had a Jesse and a Dean. I’ve come to love it and use it often in my pen name, both literary and musical.

2) When did you first get an online diary?
Oh goodness. The year I left to go to Calvin. The date? Thurday, June 27, 2002
I started this diary on 12/16/2003 at 3:15:07 PM.

3) Why did you first start an online diary?
It was a way to keep in contact with a few of my friends back home. I was writing a lot back then and it was a place to put poems down as well.

4) How did you find OpenDiary.com?
A friend of mine was using TeenOpenDiary and asked me to join before I went to college, so we could keep in touch. Neither of us had cell phones at that time.

5) When writing an entry, do you believe you are writing for you or the reader?
A little bit of both. Sometimes I write for me to get feelings out. Sometimes I write for me to sort things out in my head. Often times I write for the future. For my children and grandchildren to know that I was a real person. I love hearing the sordid details of my grandmother’s life when she was a single gal living in Chicago. I want my decendents to have that glimpse of me. I also want to remember where I’ve come from, how far I’ve gone. Its a place to stop and look back and recall.

6) When writing an entry, are you completely honest?
Yes. Cause for the elder me, I don’t want to remember the lies. I want to remember the truth.

7) Describe your writing setting:
My laptop. I didn’t start keeping an online diary until I had my own computer. Because its portable, I can take it with me. Usually there is music on and minimal light. At my desk, or on my bed, or in a chair. The physical place doesn’t matter so much.

8) Is anyone that you know (in real life) allowed to read your diary?
A precious few people. Right now I think there is only one. There have been problems and drama created when RL friends have read my diary. People annoy me. In general, everyone annoys me. I tolerate most people. I need a place to vent and be slightly immature sometimes. I don’t always want to censore what I do or say. So those precious few RL friends who read it, read it with the understand and knowledge that I may one day rag about them. They also understand that part of my annoyance with people is the bipolar irritability coming into play.

9) Do you know anyone in real life with a diary, which you are allowed to read?
Yeah, I think one person. My cousin doesn’t have her diary anymore and the other RL friends don’t keep theirs up.

10) Has anyone found your diary that you really didn’t want to find it?
Once I found out that Manny had somehow found my diary and read a lot of it. It was during a time when we weren’t really talking. He was worried and didn’t know what else to do. He actually took it really well. He understood that it was my personal diary and that I’m not always “nice” in it. I also understand that it is accessible and if someone really wanted to find it, they could.

11) Do you believe writing in your online diary is therapeutic?
Yes. For me, it requires self-reflection. I can look back even a few days, and come to new conclusions. It also allows me to put intense things out there and get feedback.

12. How many entries do you have?
This will make 808.

13) Do you have any entries that are private?
Actually, yes. 116 are private and 12 are favorites only.

14) If you answered yes to that, (without getting too personal), why don’t you want people to see them?
Sometimes there is more personal information that I was recorded, but not public. Sometimes I record letters and conversations into my diary for posterity, but I don’t want them public. Sometimes I write things I don’t want people to see. Sometimes I start writing too much for those who read my diary. Not to be cruel, but at the end of the day, the diary is for me. I need to write for me.

15) How many favorites do you have?
Actually, right now, only ten – and that includes me, two alts and the DM. So real other people? Shazar, Dreamer_Believer, CrippledStupid, snipnstaple (RL friend), summer_goth, and Rainbow Flame Burnin (RL friend who hasn’t written here in over a year)

16) Do you know who your first favorite was?
On here? I really don’t remember. On TOD when I first started was Heather, though I can’t remember her diary name.

17) Who on your faves list has been on it the longest?
Easily, Shazar. Four years and still going.

18) Which of your faves is most similar to you? Why?
All my faves have something in common with me, which is why I read them and why they read me. But we are also all very different, which is why they are my faves. So…the most similar? Shazar – age, maturity, my old soul friend.

19) Which of your faves is most different from you? Why?
The above is still true, but most different? Probably summer_goth. Just cause he is.

20) Your entire faves list has updated – whose entry do you go and read first? Second? Third? Fourth?
First would be the DM, just get that out of the way. Then would probably be summer_goth or Dreamer_Believer. Then Crippled Stupid and snipnstaple and Rainbow Flame Burnin, endin with Shazar.

21) Who is your newest fave?
Blah…I don’t even know. I think CrippledStupid, but it might be snipnstaple (though I knew her before that).

22) If you could meet any of your favs in real life (and you knew for sure they weren’t an ax murderer), who would you pick, and why?
All of them, but most Shazar, cause we seem to always be so close and yet so far. We’ve talked about the sacred line of RL vs. OD. Once you cross the computer screen you can’t go back. But someday…We will.

23) Do you talk to your favs online?
Yeah, if they happen to be online, sometimes.

24) Have you ever written an entry while too intoxicated?
Oh yeah.

25) Do you feel accepted by the diary community?
I believe a community is what you make of it. Sometimes the OD community is cruel or harsh. Sometimes they are amazingly supportive and wonderful. Sometimes they are inbetween. But I think that’s what makes it a community. We fight, we bicker, but we’re still here. So, yeah. I feel part of the community.

26) Have you secretly fell in love (or had a crush on) a diarist?
Yes, though I doubt he knows.

27) Have you ever read an entry that really moved you?
Sure. Most of my Favs have written multiple entries like that. Its why they are my favs.

28) Has anyone written anything that made you cry? What was it about?
CrippledStupid This entry made me cry because I used to believe in The One. But I’m not so sure anymore.
The others are various entries by Shazar, but he has them on Favorites Only. They are the ones about pain, heartache and anger. He just touches something in me.

29) What are your favorite kinds of entries to read?
Those entries that are almost the writer talking to themselves, arguing with themselves. They are the entries that are full of emotion and passion. You may not know all the details behind what brought about the entry, but you can see the emotion pouring off the page. I feel like for that moment, I’m allowed to see into the person a little bit.

30) After writing an entry, how long do you wait to see if you have notes?
I usually write at night, so I’ll check the next morning and then through out the day.

31) If you don’t have notes, do you feel let down?
A little bit.

32) How many notes do you usually get?
Usually only a few and just from my favs.

33) Did you know the more notes you leave, the more notes you get?
Yes, so when I’m feeling lonely, or wanting more notes, I start reading random entries or reader’s choice and leaving notes.

34) Do you delete mean or nasty notes?
If they are your basic “You’re dumb” an unsigned, yes I will. But if they are mean or nasty with a point to make and signed – I usually leave them. They show that I may have touched a nerve with someone out there.

35) Have you ever left a nasty note and not signed your name?
No. Because if I can’t accept responsibility for saying something, I shouldn’t say it.

36) Have you ever left a note on a person’s diary, just to make them feel better?
If I feel like I have something that might actually help them, yeah, I’ll say something. But I don’t like to blow smoke up people’s ass.

37) Do you keep a paper copy of your online diary?
Yes. I backup my entries onto my computer and then reformatt to look pretty. Eventually, I get around to printing them up and putting them into binders. I think I have five or six at home.

38) Do you go back and reread your past entries?
Yeah, pretty often. Sometimes I go back looking for something particular. Sometimes I go back and see what I was wrote a year ago, two years, three, etc. Sometimes I go back to see what I’ve written about particular people. I find it interesting to see how much I have changed since I started my diary.

39) What’s the most interesting thing you can think of about Opendiary?
The variety of things people chose to write about. Everyone writes on here for different reasons, and they record different things. Its interesting to see what people chose from their life to record.