I wrote this on Facebook the other day:

"One of the reasons I seldom use Livejournal anymore is that I have become fond of ephemerality. I'd never delete my LJ, as that would be dishonest and destructive, but sometimes I cringe to think all my angst and foolishness and tilting at windmills is still out there for anyone to read. There's a lot to hate about Facebook, but I do like the out-of-sight, out-of-mind quality of it."

A love of ephemerality is not necessarily good; taken to extremes, it causes me to live something of a fly-by-night life. Expired driver's licenses and such. It's also freeing, though, not to give a damn about one's own words. Yesterday, for the first time in maybe two years, I was in a Barnes & Noble. (Due to poverty and poor book-buying impulse control, I try not to go to bookstores anymore unless there is a particular book I want, and then I usually patronize one of the local independents. For everything else, I have rediscovered the wonders of the public library.) I always used to check bookstores to see if they had any of my books, and if they didn't, it would invariably annoy me. But I had been browsing in this Barnes & Noble for twenty minutes before it occurred to me that I could check. And then I realized that I didn't really give a damn if they had them or not, so I never did look. (I did buy The Babylon Rite by Tom Knox, who has the best tortures of any suspense writer I've ever read.)

[ETA: If you want to friend or follow me on Facebook, go here, or look up Billy Martin of New Orleans. All are welcome.]