Happy Anniversary to my blog!
Here is my very first blog post, on December 9, 2005: MY HUSBAND ALMOST DIED TODAY!!. How's that for a catchy title? Spoiler: He didn't, really.
Even though I have imported this entry here onto Blogger, it was originally written on MySpace. Remember MySpace? One of the things I liked about it (compared to Facebook) was the option to write and share a blog. I had seen several friends write occasional blog entries and on that particular day, since something exciting had happened, I decided to do one myself. It was quick and easy, and unlike setting up an actual blog, you didn't feel any kind of obligation to keep up with it. A lot of friends posted one single entry and then stopped, a lot posted just two or three times to communicate specific things going on. MySpace was the casual hookup of the blog world.
Back then I wrote blog entries once or twice a month with personal updates; writing about looking for a house to buy, or turning 40. Then I started write entries just to be silly or funny. Then I started sharing my photos. A lot of my friends would leave me witty and sweet comments, which unfortunately are mostly lost now that people have jumped ship on MySpace.
I started this Blogger blog in early 2007 and imported all my MySpace entries (some of which the formatting went slightly wonky). My title on MySpace was The Story of e, which I quite liked, but it wasn't available here so I settled for existence of ellen. For a while I was posting blog entries both here and on MySpace, but as time went on, fewer and fewer people used MySpace, so at some point I bailed on MySpace too and just posted here.
So. Five freakin' years! I am simulaneously impressed and appalled with myself. In the past half decade, blogs have gone from being a fairly unique way to keep a public journal to being practially obligatory. Corporations use blogs as marketing tools, news organizations use blogs as legitimate sources, blogs are trendy and fashionable.
Well, MINE is not trendy or fashionable. A lot of the people who read my blog on MySpace did not make the leap to Blogger with me, and though I do have a few loyal readers, some of whom never leave comments *waves at Jacki* and some of whom leave comments that are sometimes better than my actual blog entry *waves at Angella*, I don't have a whole lot. I feel like I started on a whim and just kept going, with no real focus.
Five years is a long time, and it makes me think. Why did I start writing a blog, really? I missed writing, and I wasn't writing anything. Writing this blog made me remember how much I love to write, and I think was instrumental in leading me back to a life of writing. Why do I keep writing it now that I have begun writing fiction? I do like keeping a web journal, and I do like the friends I've made in the bloggy world, and I do like writing things other than my novel (especially right now, as I am revising and not really writing).
However, I think I've fallen into a bad habit of only writing about what's easy, and not really being true to myself. I have been, sometimes unconsciously, afraid to be honest. I don't want to make anyone feel bad, or piss anyone off, or lose any of the small amount of readers that I do have.
Well, fuck that. I am almost 45 years old, time is a-wastin', so my new attitude about this blog is NO FEAR.
