My one-year anniversary

Today is my one-year blogging anniversary! 215 postings in a year, an average of four posts per week, which isn't as bad as I thought I was doing. I started out with a goal of five posts a week and am now only doing 2-3 but hanging in there. I've been having discussions with a friend recently who is thinking about starting a blog, and whether or not mine is "successful." She uses that word a lot when talking about blogging and when I asked her for a definition, she said "if you see blogs with 40 comments on a post, you know a lot of people are reading it."

Certainly there are blogs that attract a lot more attention than mine like the Daily Coyote written by a woman who's raising a coyote with her tomcat in Wyoming. But she doesn't really write much, it's mostly photos of this beautiful animal and people pay her $5 to receive it in their email on a daily basis. There are blogs about celebrities that get a lot more traffic and sure, comments galore, but I don't see the point in criticizing people and asking others to join in the fray. Many of those comments are downright disgusting. I'm not a well-known writer, I'm not an expert and I'm not a collection of bloggers. I didn't do it to sell advertising, create a persona or market my skills.

My plan was just to write and see where my interests lie. Maybe at some point, I thought, I would specialize in something and start a new blog just about that. I was never sure about revealing my secret identity to those who don't know it as I was a little freaked about about cyberstalking. Yet, it's not a personal blog either. One of those photos of the nephews and a post about going to grandmother's, a diary for friends and family.

I've been wondering, I suppose because of my one-year anniversary, if it's time for me to decide what it is and where it's going. Is it important for more than 40 people to read my blog? I'm not sure. There are definitely times when I wish I could share it with more people but worry about the scrutiny that would invite. It's a funny conundrum, my friend pointed out, because the Internet is all about exposure. You can't expose yourself partway. Some of the reason that I've written less in the last several months is because I'm more inwardly focused at the moment and find that I'm not comfortable writing about what's really going on with me.

It's not uncommon now for people to post photos publicly on Flickr of themselves and their families, and once when Googling a woman organizing an event I was attending, I found her personal blog that had her wedding photos and posts about her Indian husband and meeting his family, their baby, etc. It's highly personal and yet, in some ways not. It's all standard info: I'm a woman, I'm married to a man, we have a child and here are our photos. I find it far more revealing, for me, to talk about dating a 24-year old and all the issues and questions that has brought up. My interest in sharing such stories isn't about being an exhibitionist, although I worry about that being the perception.

Recently, a coworker made reference to my blog in an explanation for why she included me in an email about her work frustrations to her boss. I felt violated and betrayed, and yet, I did put it out there so from her perspective, it's public information. I suppose the question is whether there is value in me sharing my intimate thoughts and experiences. I'm reading a book now, "Eat, Pray, Love," that it seems every woman I know is reading. Much of it reminds me of my blog, actually, and I'm enjoying it so much that it seems to answer the question: Yes, if it makes another person feel understood and less crazy, there is value in sharing those personal experiences. This woman shares incredibly personal things and has her real name and her photo in the book!

On the other hand, I could see going the direction of a news blog. The New York Times just wrote about a blogger who turned his blog, Talking Points Memo, into a newspaper, and himself into a journalist by connecting the dots of what was already out in the media. His business plan was deceptively simple:
Begin as a tiny operation. Manage to gain a following. As the audience grows, ask readers for donations and accept advertising. As the advertising and donations grow, add reporters and features. Repeat as often as needed.

I could do that. I might even have interest in doing that. I certainly WANT to engage more people and wouldn't mind revealing my secret identity (I love referring to my real self as that) but I think in order to do so, I need to decide if it's personal or business. One thing is clear, I am committed to this thing called blogging. Cheers and thanks for reading!