My Log

You know, I’ve decided that blogging is a lot like breastfeeding. People either think you do it too much or not enough; no one says, “Oh, you blog just enough.” No, I either get comment a) Don’t you have anything better to do? (like what, watch reruns of Seinfeld?) or b) You need to update your blog more often. I hate going to it and finding nothing new. So let me just explain, for both sides.
I am a writer, and this means that I write. I don’t just write stories — I write in my personal journal (yes, with a pen, on real paper) and in my blog. I write e-mails and letters and thank-you cards; I write on my book and look for short-story gigs. Sometimes I write an essay, just for fun, to keep in practice. Anyone who has gotten a whopping long e-mail or letter from me knows that, I just have to write. I once had a penpal in a nearby city. T. wrote me precisely 7 letters over five years. He averaged about one a year — well, 1.2 a year or something like that. I wrote him a letter a week the first two years, then I slowed down to about one a month. He was a patient friend (or he just tossed the letters into a shoebox — I know he had several shoeboxes full of them, as he found them later, when I was in college). I don’t even know what I wrote to him about, but a lot of mundane details that must have been very boring. I just had to write, and T. was the recipient.
And you think my blog is bad.
Now, for those who think I should write more frequently, I have to say that my blog is sort of like my laboratory for writing. Probably nobody notices, but I try out different writing styles — like persuasive, funny, critical, analytical. It helps to see it posted — I look back on posts that made me laugh out loud a month ago, and cringe — did I really think that was funny? And other things that seemed blah at the time seem funnier or more pithy now. Regardless, I don’t write every single day because I run out of material, or I want to watch reruns of Seinfeld. Some days I don’t want to write on the computer, so I write in my journal or pen a letter or thank-you. And some days, I just don’t want to write at all.
I’m sure this doesn’t satisfy anyone, but hey, after all, it is my blog. If you want to gripe about it, you should start a blog of your own.