I'm sure this happens to many who start a blog.
It begins with a head full of pressing issues that require comment and critique. (Issues in which those close to the blogger are SURELY interested.)
So you write it down.
Then time does what it inevitably does. It passes. Though events occur (nieces graduated high school, attended U.S. Open, sliced finger with bread knife requiring stitches), trips are taken (Paris) and issues continue to press (economy, Iran), the blogging lapses.
I have chosen randomly from this selection of subjects to illustrate this post. It's just eye candy.
There is a notion in the marketing world these days that centers on the idea of "stickiness". It basically refers to the ability of a suggestion, proposition or behavior to gather a committed following. Books have been written about this, laden with the expected "proprietary" acronyms and principles that govern the phenomenon.
So maybe blogging isn't very sticky. (Always.)
Obviously it is for many, but not like the stickiness of avoiding an open flame with your bare hand, (contrary to myth, it's not about "not minding").
Blogging may be, for some, more like buying that new gadget you have been eying for awhile but could not quite justify. Circumstances align one day and you take the leap. You bring it home, play with it for a few days and then...it sits there.
Perhaps the allure lay in proving to yourself that you like the idea of it, could afford it, and you could make it work. But you don't really need it after all. Not to continue living a meaningful life, anyway.
In the case of blogging, I have found that I do like the idea, though it is largely indistinguishable from a web site or wiki. I can afford it, since all you need to spend is time. Plus, I can make it work which for me is another victory that includes screwing in lightbulbs.
The truth is, I don't need it to be more than a scratch pad. It's more like a "note to self" app. I have found that the only time I create a new entry is when I have something to say to myself (my favorite interlocutor). I might as well just create another Word file. Of course, the blogness enters the picture when vanity and narcissism suggest that I tell the few people who are close to me that the blog even exists, or that I have added to it. There is no rhyme, no reason to the posts. The posts just are.
I suppose in my case blogging is not quite sticky, but it does have a certain tackiness to it, like the floor of a movie house after the Saturday matinees.
After all, I did make sure to enter at least one new post in the month of June.
