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Ruth Douillette

Who Me? Blog? (Seven Reasons Why You Should, Too.)

Have you ever wanted something that you don't need? Who hasn't?
 
My most recent "want-don't-need" was a blog. I'm not even sure why I wanted one. Just for the fun of it, I guess, just to try something new. Not the best reason to enter the blogosphere.
 
Blogs are supposed to have a purpose, a raison d'etre, ranging from informing readers to sharing life with family and friends to making money.
 
My reason was simple, but weak: I just wanted one.
 
Now that I've blogged for a couple of months, a reason as good as any surfaced in my typical horse after the cart way. A personal reason, but a reason after all: My blog keeps me liking to write.
 
In addition to my day job, I write for a newspaper. That keeps me writing, but not necessarily liking it.
 
Sometimes, in my journalist mode, hastily scribbling who said what at a meeting, my heart pounds, my breathing quickens, and I want to leap from my seat and strangle a local official for his misrepresentation of facts rendered in a sarcastic tone of voice. But that would show bias, which is a journalistic no-no, so I stay seated, hoping my flushed cheeks and clenched jaw don't give my feelings away. I force my eyebrows to remain at their normal level, and stare downward if I must roll my eyes.
 
Then I go home and record the facts and who said them-- along with the lies and who told them-- until I'm sure I'll make deadline. Then I put that on hold, and let the fun begin. I blog.
 
I write about pure feeling, sheer emotion. I ramble. I make asides. I tweak facts to suit me-- just a tiny bit, and not often-- use a sarcastic tone of voice, or a wisdom filled one . . . I can do what I want. I'm my own boss.
 
I never plan what to blog. Planning stilts my voice, a voice that blogging has helped me to uncover. I start with something that strikes me funny, makes me mad, or arouses my curiosity, something inconsequential in the larger scheme of things that begs for expression, and I turn my fingers loose on the keyboard.
 
For me, blogging is kind of like using a Ouija board. Fingers guide, words form, and when that stops, I look to see where I ended up.
 
The best part is clicking "publish" after only a quick, superficial edit. No labor intensive, rewrite, no Thesaurus search. Just my keyboard and me, wild and free.
 
And if you're wondering who would possibly want to read such a blog, you have a point. But I have my few loyal fans, and they're not all family. Just don't tell them the blog is about me, and my staying in love with writing. Any pleasure I might bring to others is pure frosting on my cake. And maybe theirs, if I'm lucky.
 
The truth about blogging:
 
Blogging is fun. There is no deadline except a self imposed one, although if you do happen to attract a reader or two, you need to keep posting at fairly regular and predictable intervals. There are too many exciting things that compete with checking to see if you have updated your blog. Someone initially interested will find pleasure elsewhere if you are a slow poster.
 
Blogging keeps writing skills sharp. Nothing improves a skill like practice. Consider your blog a warm-up exercise. Consider it practice. Write faithfully, no less than weekly, and watch your skills improve.
 
Blogging helps develop voice. Thinks of it as talking, not writing. No need for literary devices, no need to foreshadow and come full circle and create an arc. Just "talk" in your normal voice, let the words come. That's your voice you hear. So simple. So you.
 
Blogging feeds the ego. Who can't use a little ego boost now and then? Install a stat counter on your blog and see who visits. (If your ego is shaky this can backfire, so beware. Installing a stat counter can show that no one has visited.) Within less than two months I had visitors from the east and west hemispheres and north and south as well. So what if some were "web spiders"-- techie scanners seeking key words-- rather than humans. They left a mark on my visitor map. That's cool.
 
Blogging provides instant gratification. Unlike other forms of publication that require queries, submissions, rejections, over and over, a blog is published at the click of the mouse whenever you want. Instantly. Never a remote possibility of rejection. If you later sit up in bed, blushing over something you've written, you can crawl out of bed and delete it, then sleep easy.
 
Blogging can be lucrative. For the serious minded blogger offering information, or something else people seek, a blog can become a source of income. The more visitors you get, the more advertisers will pay to be listed on your blog. Sounds good, but for me that would take away all the fun, and would turn writing once again into serious business.
 
For now, I'll blog for fun, and hope that others might find some pleasure there as well.


About the Author
Ruth Douillette is a middle-school teacher in Massachusetts where she has encouraged young writers for over thirty-three years. She writes profiles, features, and news for a local paper, and appears as a regular guest on "Around the Table," a local cable talk show. Her work has been published in the Christian Science Monitor, flashquake, and "Under Our Skin," an anthology about breast cancer. Blogging is a new venture. Ruth's blog, Up Stream and Down, can be found at: http://upstreamanddown.blogspot.com