Blogging

As I've been catching up on my blog-reading this week, I've noticed that quite a few people have been a philosophical mood - discussing stash and blogging. Queen of the Froggers wrote a particularly nice piece about her views on blogging. Inevitably, I started thinking about this too.

Blogging is a fairly new activity for me - my first post 'published' in December last year. I have never been much of a diary writer, but the idea of having a blog always appealed. Why this should be, I've no idea. The idea of spouting my views and putting them into a public sphere for anyone to read filled me with unease. Now, I am no stranger to the soap box or my high horse, and I trained to be a journalist, so why would I be so nervous of sharing my thoughts in this way?

There were several reasons for this:

1. It seems to me that for many people chatting online there are not the same "courtesy controls" as in day-to-day, face-to-face life. There are no reins on some of the sheer spite that people feel they have the right to vent. Despite being a stroppy mare recently, I don't really like rows. Did I want to open myself up to such behaviour?

2. Why would anyone want to read my views on anything? I didn't actually have anything to talk about. For example, I didn't want to have a blog commenting on the news - there are many, many other people doing this and doing this far more eloquently than I could. While I find my life interesting and exciting, I'm not a fan of the "Christmas Letter" approach that people inflict on families and I would be taking wider with the internet.

So what changed?

I started knitting and while my Mam has taken up knitting, and my friends are impressed by the finished products, there's no-one I can talk to really enthusiastically about my hobby. Actually, some people get a strange look in their eyes if they think I'm waxing too lyrically about sock yarn. :-) Understandably - now I get a taste of how it feels to be an IT geek like the BF.

I love the fact that I can bimble on, on my blog, about what I'm making - its progress and the yarns I'm using. I'm not an expert on knitting, by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm learning and I'm really enjoying the learning.

When I first started the blog, I made myself some rules. I was only going to talk about knitting, yarn, plans for projects and shopping for yarn. My personal life was to remain out of it. However, that hasn't been possible. It's inevitable that personality and life creeps into the posts - it's probably more interesting that it does. I personally prefer blogs that are a mixture of knitting and life because I'm interested in people and their lives. (And those of certain monkeys too).

Recently, the stress of the rubbish that has been going on with moving house has made me post more personal posts too. It's been really helpful for me. I've been so angry and depressed by it all that blogging about the situation has made me feel like I've been letting off steam to a lot of people.

So, there are no more rules - I'll post what I feel like posting. Here, have a chocolate!