On Blogging

I'm not a writer. This month I will have been a blogger for half a year. Before that writing was a diversion (for me) and a distraction (for my cousin Tracy and my brother Barry, who had to read my stuff). So I don't claim to know a lot about writing, and I have no business telling others how to write. But I know what I like.

When I read anything, I ask myself 3 questions:

- What is he/she saying?
- How did he/she say it?
- Do I believe him/her?

That's what I look for; content, craft and candor. (Forgive me for the three C's thing.)

Sometimes I read blogs that are simply a delight to the eyes. And I'm not one to read for recreation. The thing is, sometimes I enjoy reading something, but then I think about it a bit and realize that the author put a lot of words together cleverly without actually saying anything, or if he/she did have something to say, it was worthless.

Of course, value is in the eye of the beholder, and the eyes of the writer are the ones that count. I do it myself. The things I write about my kids probably aren't very valuable to anyone outside my family, but if it tells them how I feel about them (and helps me remember it), that's enough for me – and if readers outside that small circle don't like it or don't get it – well, I don't care. So, I guess the value of a blog's content depends on who it was aimed at and how important it is to the target audience.

Craft, how something is written, is very subjective, but for me the key is communication. How well did I convey to someone else not only what I think, but how I feel about it? Did I clarify myself – and if s/he didn't understand what I'm saying, did s/he at least understand Me?

I am of the minimalist persuasion. Some writers will carpet bomb their readers with words. I think their concept is that while the overwhelming majority of what they write is irrelevant, something will hit someone randomly by right of the law of averages. The problem with redundancy when writing is familiar in the military; if you try to hit everything, you end up hitting nothing. One has to remember that the guys on the receiving end aren't stupid, and once they see incoming, everyone takes cover. In blogging, it's clicking over to something else.

Then there are artsy-smartsy bloggers. They puff and fluff it up with lots of needless or poor metaphors, tack on needless and obscure adjectives and throw in pointless anecdotes that have no connection whatsoever to what they are saying. They're trying to be clever, but actually they are defeating themselves. Any intelligent reader knows when something is being stretched out like saltwater taffy (there – see – I did it now myself.)

In The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy shoots metaphors in bursts, but pulls it off because they are so good and so on the money that it works to her favor. In most cases, however, I don't appreciate being on the business end of meaningless metaphor. A lot of writers do this and they are (to use Roy's metaphor), "polishing firewood".

And honesty. Does the written square with the writer? Do they actually believe what they are saying, or are they saying things they don't mean because they think it will tickle the ear of the reader? Without knowing the blogger personally, it's hard to tell, but sometimes you have the opinionated trying to appear open-minded, the shallow digging holes way over their heads. It's probably something all of us do to some degree, coming off as something we're not. So it's a rare gift when a blogger has the guts to be brutally honest with himself and the reader.


I've chosen 3 bloggers that I enjoy; each is stronger in one of my three C's.

Xiu/Megan

I have featured her in My People a few times. She's an 18 year old Singaporean (Singaporese?). It's obvious from her blog "January Winds" that she's well read, well educated and, in my opinion, she's brilliant. Some of the best things she's written are the shortest ones. I suspect that she has imported techniques from Chinese poetry to the English language – a feat that only one fluent in both languages can pull of as well as she does.

This is a comment she wrote here once:

"I used to hang upside down on a monkeybar,

just so that those tears would not flow down,

in case my eyes get swollen.

those times when I was little.

i would just hang upside down for ages;

and as simple as a child i was,

i forget about everything unhappy after a while,

and I walk away."
(comment on "It's Okay to Cry")

Most remarkable is her honesty. She's simply out there, something not many are able to do.

Even her naval piercing.

This is something I found in her blog from a couple of years ago when she first started blogging:

"Comments are not the measure of blog success.
Don't bother whoring for comments. It's simply not worth it."
Stella Sez, January Winds (blogspot)

She's pretty much lived up to that.

(January Winds moved to Wordpress about a month ago.)

Liz Strauss

Liz at "Letting Me Be" is about the best example of good writing in a blog I've seen. For the most part, her stuff has substance as well, but even when it doesn't, you hardly notice it because she writes so well.

"Something happens when I write on the Internet. Perhaps it's the fact that (I) know other people are writing on other screens words that I'll read. It simply be that I'm looking up as if another person is sitting across from me. I am more aware that I'm talking with my keys -- that my words are a doorway to relationships."

From "Please Don't Stop"


For a sample of Liz's style, I recommend this; "Knowing Everything" and more

Olivia M. Brigham

Lastly, Olivia at Inspired by Grace. Olivia deals with a variety of issues, both personal and not. She's not very old, but she has amazing perception and depth. The interesting thing is that prose isn't her strongest genre; it's what she's able to express with photographs that's unique - the text is commentary. (This should come as no surprise as she is a professional photographer).

Olivia captured the experience of pilgimage, walking where Jesus walked, on film in a way most aren't able with words. See her blog under the Israel label, or my post about her - "Hands Revisited"

.

My blog is the product of stuff rattling around in my head. I ask myself three things when I blog something:

- Do I have something to say? (What is it?)

- Do I know how I want to express it? (Will anyone get it? Who?)

- Do I want to spill my guts. (And how much?)

I'm not a writer. I don't know how well I have kept my own standards of good blogging, but I try and I'm learning. And to you, dear readers, my thanks for your patience.