Confessions of a Blogger

I read this post the other day (written by Heidi's sister. I totally lurk on her blog) and really liked it. Mostly the microtrends she would like to see occur in the blogging world, which are as follows:

Here are some micro trends I'd like to see emerge:

Confessional blogging.

Blogging about how you hate your parents.

Blogging about free stuff you want to give to me.

Before and after pictures of a room or house you totally trashed.

Blogs about crafts that make themselves.

Blogs about flaws and physical defects.

Blogs that worship me.

Blogs about Guitar Hero.

Blogs that somehow preview and select the best and funniest YouTube videos for me to watch, with links.

I have, for a while now, been slightly annoyed by the rut I have fallen into as a "blogger." I don't like that word, by the way, it's stupid, but I digress. I began blogging as a way of working things out for myself - writing down things that happened or things that bugged me and if no one read it, that was all the better, then I didn't have to get into details of why I was frustrated, upset, happy, sad, etc. Then I switched from LiveJournal and more people started reading my blog. People I know and love. People I interact with on a daily basis. People who might be the source of my frustration. Now, there's no problem if they're the source of my happiness, but I'm not the type to go and write everything down in a public forum when someone has caused me worry or stress knowing full well that someone might read what I have written. But I do want to write it down.

There's the kicker. I suck at journaling - blogging is really a great outlet for me because it's like journaling but it's also keeping in touch with friends and staying up to date on what's happening in their life so when we do talk, it's a little more real. But I don't want to hurt feelings or make matters worse. How can you be honest and really use the blogging world to your advantage and still open yourself up to a community? Confessional blogging really can only come through anonymity - unless you really, truly don't care who reads it and/or what people would think.

Most of the blogs I read contain some amount of venting/confessing/frustration posts - I feel like I, personally, vent quite a bit on my blog - but that's because, as I said before, writing things down helps me figure them out. That's usually when you lucky people get to read posts like this - slightly rambling, somewhat confusing, but ending in some kind of point or resolution. That's when some of you get phone calls for no good reason but to talk things out. They are completely selfish posts/phone calls. Yesterday I wanted to listen to you and hear how you are doing - Today I want you to listen to me. Hopefully that's cool and completely understandable. The amazing thing about venting via blog is you don't really have to read this post and that's okay. I won't know. No blog fairy is going to come tattle on you. If you answer, you answer. If you don't, at least I had the chance to get things off my chest. I guarantee I felt at least a little better the minute I hit "publish post" and didn't really expect anyone to leave a comment. Sometimes there are no comments to leave. That's just that.

It's already pretty clear that I like to have separate blogs for certain topics (Reading Loons, Projects, England, etc.). That's the organizer in me (or more accurately, that's my blogging OCD shining through). So if you see more pop up, don't be surprised. Don't even feel obligated to read them. I feel like experimenting. I may not even share the link. Who knows. I just think it's time to spice things up...so that's what I'm going to do. But I promise I won't be creating the Guitar Hero blog Kacy dreams of - I really really suck at that game.