This week, I am chipping away at some of the creative, thought-provoking questions readers have been asking. This round of lovely questions is all about blogging. 

From JoyMarieCooks of Vegan Husband, Omnivore Wife:

How did you decide to blog and what’s been (a) the best thing (b) the most surprising thing and (c) the worst thing about blogging?

The first blogs I ever read were wedding planning blogs, way back in 2007. It must have been from Wedding Bee that I found the first personal blogs I started reading, although I can’t really remember which blogs they were. Almost none of those blogs I read from the beginning exist today. But what struck me was that they were so friendly, so conversational, and that they mostly seemed to be about women like me, who were newly engaged or married and who just wanted to chat about their experiences. 

When my husband and I moved to a brand new city in a brand new state so he could begin his medical residency, I started this blog. I can’t remember my exact reasoning, only that I’d been thinking about it for a long time. Since I worked remotely, and had just moved to a place where I knew almost no one, I thought it would be a good way to process my thoughts about wifehood and moving and being married to a doctor.

The most surprising thing about blogging is how important it has become to me. It’s a potent combination of diary and slumber party, maybe? I can be honest here in a way I feel I can’t be elsewhere – I can talk about the minutiae of day-to-day life without watching anyone’s eyes glaze over, I feel like I can be chatty with friends with no worries about whether people are gossiping about me behind my back. (Although maybe they are; who knows.) There was a time when life felt too busy and stressful to blog regularly, and I missed it and I am so glad that it is a regular feature of my life again. 

The worst thing about blogging is that the friendships don’t translate into real life. I can’t call you up and say, “Hey, I’m bringing over cookies and wine!” or invite you over to watch reruns of Schitt’s Creek. I want to do that. Although I admit I’m a little afraid, too – what if you don’t like Real Life Suzanne? (I am mainly the same as Blog Suzanne, just less wordy and much more awkward.) So even as this community uplifts me and makes me feel included and supported and part of something, it can also be a little lonely. 

From Ally of The Spectacled Bean:

As a longtime blogger thinking about your approach to personal blogging, which is more important to you: writing your own posts then replying to all the comments you’ve received– OR reading other bloggers’ posts and leaving comments for them? That is, do you see your role primarily as a creator or a coach?

This is SUCH a thought-provoking question. I’ve been considering it for a long time. Starting at the end of the question, I have literally never thought of myself in terms of either a creator or a coach. I suppose if I were to put a label on myself, and what I do here, I would call myself a community member. My blog isn’t geared toward anything in particular; it’s just me, posting about my silly little life, trying to engage with other people. The writing part is valuable for me, because it allows me to work through my own thoughts, allows me to empty my brain. But the engagement is even more valuable, because it enables me to feel like I belong to something big and warm and friendly. Maybe most bloggers are more intentional about their goals as a blogger, or their designs for content, and that’s great. But for me, it’s more of a conversation.

That said, I don’t think I have a specific philosophy about commenting. I try to read all the blogs I can, and comment on them as frequently as possible. Sometimes I try to respond to comments on my posts, but I don’t respond to all of them; perhaps to my detriment, I don’t know. I like it when other bloggers respond to my comments, but I don’t mind it when they don’t. And sometimes it doesn’t feel “right” to respond, or sometimes I don’t have time, or I can’t find the right way to say what I want to say. I do, however, read every single comment anyone posts, and appreciate the time and energy required both to read my lengthy droning and to share your thoughts. 

From Stephany of Stephany Writes: 

What made you decide to make (and keep!) your blog completely anonymous?

At first, I think the decision was made out of embarrassment? Or maybe shyness is a more accurate term? I wanted to write things, maybe personal things, and I didn’t want anyone to know it was ME writing them. (That’s so dumb, because I feel like the people reading this do know me. Maybe even know me better, in some ways, than people who don’t read this blog.) Then it became a matter of me wanting to write about things that I wouldn’t necessarily want connected back to my husband – like, do his patients need to read a post about how cute I think he looks in scrubs? No, they do not. 

While the latter is still true, I also think that the anonymity is for my sake. My mom read my blog for awhile (and still may; I don’t know and prefer not to!) and when I thought about her reading my posts, my writing felt stilted, like I was being watched. I’ve had a couple of real-life/pre-blogging friends read this blog, and that was okay, but it still felt a little uncomfortable. Like has your spouse/parent/sibling ever looked over your shoulder while you were writing an email or a text? A perfectly ordinary, non-controversial, non-scandalous email or text? I hate that; it makes me very self-conscious. Knowing people I know in the offline world read my blog is kind of like that feeling.

At one point, I got word that someone who knew my husband read this blog… maybe she still does, I don’t know. But THAT was super awkward, because I felt like everything I said reflected on him. Now I didn’t have to just worry that my mom was wondering HOW I’d gotten through college using quite so many exclamation points, but I had to worry that my husband’s colleagues were thinking he was married to a weird overly enthusiastic dolt. It sucks, but my writing does reflect on him, in a way. I think that’s part of the reason that I don’t like to discuss politics or Big Subjects – because I don’t want anyone misconstruing my poorly-constructed thoughts as his. (The other part is that the world is FULL of intelligent – and not – discourse on Big Subjects that we can choose to read. Plus, that’s not what I want to write about, so I don’t write about it.) Also, I do write a lot about my experiences parenting here… and I don’t want Carla to be googleable because of that. 

I would say that at this point, it’s a very loose approximation of anonymity. But that’s okay. I like the facade. 

Thank you all so much for your questions! If you have any other questions you’d like me to answer, about blogging or anything else, feel free to fill out my Ask Me Anything form.

It seems as though I am doing NaBloPoMo this month, which is 30 blog posts in 30 days. (Will I make it??? Only time will tell.) Details at San’s blog here.