Reality Bites by James Norton for the week of Jan. 18

Speaking to the Fourth Wall cannot help in a city full of the mentally obdurate

Yikes!  I must seem like a broken record to you ‚Äì the reader.  Over and over and over again, I have tried to get through to certain people through my pedantic musings here.  Every once in a blue moon, I get lucky and the exact person or group I was attempting to speak to does get the hint and attempts to reach out and meet at some sort of common ground.  Then, unfortunately, I sometimes get the small minded who seem to want to be confrontational and lob grenades, until of course, they have the record set straight for them.  You see it‚Äôs really quite simple – I get to write my opinion in a newspaper every other week.  You think it‚Äôs easy?

  Be that as it may, those of you who read only the print edition of the paper miss out to some degree.  I‚Äôm not talking about the overly paranoid who have the silly belief that if they never ever log onto our weblog from their home and work computer, that people will actually believe that they don‚Äôt know what‚Äôs going on there.  There‚Äôs at least a dozen people I know of who believe that ‚Äì does that seem sane to you?
  I‚Äôm talking about those who may be too busy to take ten minutes per day to navigate onto our weblog or the odd chance that someone under the age of 65 doesn‚Äôt own a computer.
  You are the people who are missing out on some funny stuff.  Yeah I know the Editor puts in a few choice clips from the weblog in the paper every week, but oh there is much more you have missed.
  Some of the most ingeniously written fiction, sprinkled with a bit of truth and peppered with a healthy dose of sarcastic ambition can be found there on any given day or night by an entire cast of fictional characters who have seemingly become intertwined with each other, even though their true identities are unknown to each other and even to us.
   There are people who visit the weblog and transform themselves into characters such as:  The Late Mrs. McCarthy, The Mole, Cambriville News, Tricky, Of Course and many others ‚Äì these people have taken commentary and brought it into the realm of pseudo-storytelling to a degree that even for the non-paranoids it‚Äôs sometimes hard to tell fact from fiction, private person from contributor.
    I try to maintain order on the weblog without being overly censorious and I have created a set of ‚ÄúRules‚Äù to posting a comment.  Sure, it‚Äôs a public weblog, so we get the occasional pinhead who says something over the top, mentions a civilian or a family member, mentions someone‚Äôs home address, makes over the top and libelous accusations, etc.  Monitoring the weblog is not my full-time job, but I get notification every time someone posts something on my cell phone and a computer is typically not that far away. 
   Back several months ago, we here at the paper started talking about the activity on the weblog.  There was a pattern emerging with a core group of people who were becoming regular ‚Äúbloggers.‚Äù  There was also another core group of people who didn‚Äôt join the fray, but had  become avid ‚Äúwatchers‚Äù.
   Finally, there would invariably be the third group of ‚Äútransitionals‚Äù who were comprised of ‚Äúone time comments‚Äù, rookies looking to make the a-list of ‚Äúbloggers‚Äù and of course the egoistically bruised politician, relative, lover, thug wannabe, pod person, retard, whatever you want to label them.  These were typically the mental midgets who don‚Äôt understand that in this world of milk and honey, when you‚Äôre a public figure on any level, you are fair game, period.  That‚Äôs part of the landscape of life, be it politically, municipally or professionally.
   That entire concept, which is widely accepted almost everywhere else reasonable people live, has been lost on at least a generation and a half only within the walls of THIS city and nowhere else on the planet.  You would almost think that ‚ÄúA Civil Action‚Äù was based on Somerville and not Woburn ‚Äì the funny part about it is instead of the drinking water being contaminated ‚Äì it‚Äôs the Kool Aid that people can‚Äôt get enough of around here.
    There is plenty of real life commenting about important issues as well, don‚Äôt get the wrong idea ‚Äì it isn‚Äôt all fantasyland.  The gritty and visceral combination of fact and fiction in the writing is mesmerizing and you have no obligation to post a comment.  Nobody will EVER know you‚Äôve been there or if you‚Äôve ever posted a comment ‚Äì that‚Äôs the power of free speech at work.  Just remember, post a comment on anything outside the rules and you‚Äôll suffer my wrath, otherwise I‚Äôm quite sure you‚Äôll enjoy the reading.
    One final note ‚Äì unlike the Farm Team, we don‚Äôt sit by an answering machine and edit what we think would be good for submission on the weblog.  Keep that in mind when you‚Äôre looking for local, unbiased news reporting the way it should be.
Check the weblog out  – www.thesomervillenews.com – and join the cast of characters.