The Strange and Wonderful World of Blogging

When my husband asked me if I'd blogged yesterday, shortly before it was time to go to beddy-bye, I sheepishly had to answer in the not-affirmative.  Which is becoming much more common these days, as I struggle to figure out what (if anything!) I have to share that's worth your precious time.  I want you to want to stop by, I do; and I want to have something amusing or enlightening or interesting to tell you.

While I was procrastinating this morning (not quite ready to work on a blog post of my own), I stopped by Colleen's Martin Family Moments, a great site if you haven't found it yet, and was amused by the "Blogger's Prayer" on her home page.  I hope she doesn't mind if I share it with you here at String of Pearls.  It is so clever...and so true. 

THE BLOGGERS PRAYER

Lord help me to learn to spell without spellcheck, manage to visit all that visit me,
and post regularly--all in 5 minutes a day, so that I can clean house and take care of my family.

Help me to not look at every occurrence in my life as a blog post,
and to quit taking pictures of weird things to share as well.

Please Lord, help me to stop talking about my blog friends as though they are next door neighbors or someone I have known all of my life.

And help me dear Lord, to think of something witty and wise to post tomorrow.

~The Dust Bunny Hostage

One of the reasons I procrastinate when it comes to working on new blog posts is that I love to read the blogs of others--and that not only takes up time, but it also eats away at my confidence, because I realize how much wittier and wiser so many of the bloggers out there are.  And how many loyal followers they have.  I will never be a Colleen Martin.  Or a Grace.  (If you're a blogger and you're reading this, I don't even have to add Grace's last name, because you know I'm talking about the comic genius behind Camp Patton.) 

If you haven't found the blogs of these uber-talented gals yet, you should head over and check them out.  (I'll wait for you.  I'll be here when you come back.)

Sometimes I think I was a better blogger back in the beginning, when I was fresh and full of ideas and I would jump out of bed each day, anxious to post something before most people go to work in the morning.  Back in those good old days, I had absolutely no expectations of gaining any followers--other than the handful of family members who would tell me that reading my ramblings was something they liked to do while they drank their morning coffee...and I'm definitely disappointing them these days, aren't I?  Because if I do get a post up at all, it's more likely to be long after the last cup of coffee (or bowl of oatmeal) has been consumed.

"Bear, let's get out our laptops and see what's going on in the blog world, shall we?"

Don't get me wrong, I still love blogging.  And I still have no expectations of gaining a big following, because that was really never my purpose when I set this thing up almost three years ago.  I started this blog to record memories for my family and to have a writing outlet that would feed my need to rearrange words and play around with them until they sound the way I want them to.  The fact that people who aren't related to me stop by every now and then and leave the kindest comments has been an unexpected bonus.  The fact that I have connected with other bloggers and corresponded with them so frequently that I feel like they are my friends (at least as much as any pen pal would have been in days of yore) is another amazing bonus.  I have come to realize that it's a very small Catholic blogging world; the longer you inhabit that universe, the more you see the same names pop up.  So blogging has become a way for me to feel a part of something so much bigger than myself--to play my own small role in the new evangelization being brought about by Catholic women bloggers.

So I'm here to stay (for the foreseeable future, anyway).  I'll share family anecdotes and photos; I'll tell you which books and movies I enjoy; I'll promote the Catholic Faith, in all its beauty (to the best of my ability);  I'll post the occasional recipe, or a work of art that speaks to me (and vintage art always seems to speak the loudest)...

Love, love, love this!

The whole blogging thing is a bit strange--I mean, as Colleen's "Bloggers Prayer" points out, we bloggers tend to take pictures of weird things that might be post-worthy later on, and to think of every occurrence as a blog post; but if so, I guess I just have to admit that I'm a bit strange.  Because I like having my own little spot in the blog world, and I'm not ready to vacate it just yet.