Taking stock

One of my closest friends keeps asking, of keeping a blog, "Yes, but what is it for?". I think she has a point. I don't really know what this is for.

I've become increasingly uneasy & inhibited about splurging family 'stuff' in a semi-public place. I could probably have wirtten anonymously about my husband's health, my kids' various endeavours & the like, but pretty much everyone who reads this knows who I am, & therefore who they are, & it doesn't feel right. On the other hand, I can hardly run each entry past an editorial panel to negotiate what should/should not be published! I admired TRT's blog until I found myself asking awkward questions about how the unwitting 'victim' of his posts might feel... Actually I do still admire it - he's an intelligent & witty writer - but I no longer feel any desire to emulate it.

I've also become more self-conscious (present post notwithstanding!) about inebriated late-night ramblings that people might come across - by 'people' I mean colleagues, students, family members, family members' partners/friends/acquaintances... All that 'you're my besshht mate you are - hic - & the Innernet's wunnerful innit - hic', not to mention the occasional 'I hate the world & I hate myself & I want to DIE' moments, are so embarrassingly adolescent. On the other hand, if I'm going to censor & sanitise, what's the point?

I've been looking back at Nog's posts that brought me back into the world of blogging after an initial nervous encounter that had been quickly abandoned. He wrote, back in May 2005:

I think it's an opportunity to try a different voice, it need not be responsive in the way that emails and conference postings usually are - it can be didactic, I can direct it without reference to a specific function for this area, I'm writing for an unknown audience (...) an opportunity for public introspection, a vocal meditation. So not only pompous but also self-indulgent and conceited! :-)

I've no idea whether he still feels the same way, having moved on to more specifically educational applications (as did I, with the more comfortably focused Connecting wth H806) but I'm now finding the "different voice" too ill-defined to serve any real purpose.

I'd quite like to post humorous & incisive reflections on my Daily Doings, in the manner of Non-Working Monkey. I'd also enjoy putting up a regular sarky commentary on the BBC News site's illogical & ungrammatical reports. Or I could produce a diary of My Life As An OU Tutor (with carefully anonymised references to colleagues & students). But what would it be for?

Well, that's the spare Christmas sherry finished, & if you've made it to the end of this little piece of self-indulgence, I guess you can join the ranks of "besshht mates" :-)