Why Write?

Once upon a time blogs seemed to be the hot thing. People got book deals. Inner worlds were exposed. Those who wrote were either brave or stupid, exhibitionists, egoists, etc. The Internet, once just for porn was now for soul exposing intrigue and nosiness.

And then there was overload. Every one had a blog. Everyones mother had a blog. Everyones mothers ten cats each had their very own blog. People didn't update enough. People didn't say enough. Good bloggers disappeared. Blog readers became jaded. Expected more. Commented less.

Yet the blog persists. I have written before that I certainly don't see my blog as an exercise in attention. There are very few people who I know through my regular life that know about this blog and I think count to a total of three (unless one of them has told someone else which is possible). Only one of those people did I specifically tell about the blog. I think the other two found it. It's not that hard, something I have also previously discussed. Something I sort of regret at this point, but I don't see a good way to change.

I am amazed that I have had this blog over five years and managed to stay generally anonymous and out of the eye of friends and family, whom I admit, I speak about with some degree of regularity. Saying things I probably wouldn't say to their faces uninvited or unasked, but simply recording my thoughts on my life as I live it. So this blog is for me.

Which isn't to say I don't like the comments I get from readers, or knowing that people (even if it's a very small number) read. But it often feels more like a Greek chorus than a group of people I know in any way. The universal voice. Everyone wants to speak out to the ether and be answered, and so goes a blog.

Recently, friend S, the newly married, moved to Africa. Not really wanting to be there, and not having a job (or a television or a reliable Internet connection, or a car for that matter), she was thinking she needed something to do. S can be one of the funniest friends of mine in a really sharp way so I thought about it and told her she should write a blog. But not a blog where she tries to be funny or writes to her friends and family far away, but a blog where she records accurately how she feels about this place she doesn't really want to be, how it affects her new marriage, and how the next two years generally go for her (presumably they're going to try baby making soon, so add that to the things to write about). I figured this was a book I might buy, and certainly a book she might write, after the fact- something she says she has always wanted to do. I thought it was a good idea.

And I thought I convinced her it was a good idea. Her first post was full of promise- the delicate expression of fears, the biting humor. Her voice was taking shape.

Then, not two posts in, she decided to tell all of her friends and family about her blog. So far her mother, and this asshole twat from her wedding have felt the need to comment on every post. And her third post starts to lose the voice, pandering to the audience. Sanitizing.

I'm disappointed.

I know you can't make people do things, and I know that her blog will probably become an amusing place to tell stories and keep up with people. But I am pretty sure the new path it's taking means it won't have the substance necessary for a book. It won't be 'real' enough. And it makes me sad because I think she could have really done this thing and it would have been amazing.

But then again, maybe being stranded in a very foreign country where you pretty much don't at all want to be means that it's more important to have that sort of contact from people than it is to write down your thoughts where you continue to dwell on how much you don't like feeling stranded and alone.

Ah well.

As for me, five years on in my corner of the Internet and I have nothing particularly interesting that would make a book, don't have a legion of loyal readers, and have somehow, for the most part, managed to keep my anonymity while writing down for the most part pretty much exactly what I want to.

I don't mind that. After all, it's really just for me.