Following: An Experiment

I suppose without context this blog might only appeal to me, which is fine, but then if I wanted to be the only person to understand it why would I do it online? Anonymity is useful for discouraging bias, but I personally find it a struggle to connect with an entirely unknown source.

Lets do an experiment.

Read slowly, think fast.

I came into the world in 1988.

Picture me in day to day life for a moment

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What assumptions did you just make?

Supposing an answer you manufactured was about my current relationship status. Am I married? No. I am divorced actually. Does that surprise you?  I guess maybe not, depending on your culture and geographical location. Did you read the word ‘divorced’ and presume I’m single and unhappy?

I have a wonderful home, a loving partner and one dependant.

Picture that

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What does that tell you? Do I rent or own my home? Is it a mansion or a tent? My mind conjures flowers and cottages whenever people describe their home as ‘wonderful’. Is my partner male or female? What do I mean by dependant?

I bought my three bedroom terrace house in 2013. With a mortgage of course, this is ‘An Average Life‘ after all. My boyfriend and I have a cocker spaniel puppy and our garden grows an impressive variety of flora every year considering we never plant nor water them.

I wonder now, how many correct conclusions you drew before and after each fact? Are you stereo-typing against your will? Whether you consciously chose to assign characteristics to me or not, your mind will do it if you close your eyes and imagine.

Here’s one I’d struggle to guess at this point, what is my occupation? Do I even have one? Having read what I’ve written so far, what would you assume?

Pick three career paths for me

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Did you guess? Until recently I was a retail fashion manager for a world renowned LTD company. I will ask though, does the phrase ‘world renowned’ connote a positive opinion to you? Would you have less trust in my writing if that was an unjustified implication, even though you’d formed it yourself?

Did my vocabulary tip you off that I am English yet? Or did you acknowledge my username at the beginning to ascertain I am a female in the United Kingdom. Westcountry by the way.

You know my name but you have no idea of my race or religion. Had you presumed one for me yet? Will you do so now that I’ve mentioned it?

Who am I?

Which of these facts, if any, do you find necessary for you to identify with another’s writing? Would you have stopped reading earlier if I was a stay-at-home parent, a successful business owner, an unemployed flat-sharing artist or a grandmother in retirement housing?

Perhaps you formed a few perceptions between the italics, don’t forget though, that would only be your own suppositions. Suppositions that could also teach us about our own current mindsets

With a non-specific blog such as this I give myself complete freedom of content and massive scope for judgement or misinterpretation of its purpose. Such is the internet.

So this is me, this is mine, I’m happy to share, do what you will with it.