Interview, Part I

How long have you been blogging, and what was your inspiration to start your blog?

I've been blogging here for almost two years, since December of 2005. I started blogging about seven months before that though, on a blog that I deleted when I started this one.

A friend unintentionally introduced me to the idea when she started a blog chronicling the planning for her son's bar mitzvah. I started one a few months after I first read hers. That particular blog was very hidden, as much as I could make it, and I didn't tell anyone. It was on Blogspot as well, and I found that many times I would draft something without ever posting it. Not that it mattered anyway, since no one knew.

In November 2005, I was part of a group discussion on blogs and blogging in general. I mentioned (offhand, very late, in a foggy state) that I had been blogging. Because I know Julie all too well, I knew she'd search for it. And may or may not find it. Not that it mattered really, but it was much more introspective and personal. I ended up deleting that blog. There was no audience, and I had no real plan for it, so it wasn't all that fantastic anyway.

But at any rate, I deleted that one and started anew, this time with the idea that I would tell a few people about it, and there would be other people reading. Theoretically, anyway.

I use my blog as a journal of sorts, to remind myself where I was at that point. Sometimes I use it to chronicle our homeschooling activities or to share something with others. But mostly it's just for me to ramble on about our days.

Diane never knew that her blog about Max's bar mitzvah would inspire my own rambling blog. I'm not even sure that she knows now, but I'm glad that she started hers. It's opened my eyes -- to my own seriously diminished writing skills, to excellent ideas from others, and to meeting people whom I would have never met otherwise.