You know what's scary? Going to a dinner function where you know nobody so you put your brave face on. And then when you're 'mingling' industriously, you meet one, two, three, four (oh sh**) five different strangers who say - "Yes, I know you. I read your blog!"
Way to put your blathering blithering rants into perspective. When you are face to face with complete strangers who know basically TOO MUCH about you...your Fabulous five children...your fascination with SBW's tattoos...your inclination to drink too much Diet Coke...the excessive number of times you wish you could duct tape your Little Son's mouth shut...your dream about flying off into the sunset with Thor...the time you tried to sell cinnamon rolls at the local market and endured extreme humiliation... You know nothing about them but they know that you told your teenage son's girlfriend "We don't want him to have sex at this age and I really hope you're not a skanky ho'" They know you sometimes wish you could run away from your children. And that you tell lies. 'You are the best dancer ever!' (but really, I got here too late to catch your two second recital. Oops.) Let's face it - I say way too much on this blog. I'm way too open about everything. And half the time, people who know me are probably perpetually worrying that I will blog about them next. And wishing that I would shut up on here. I'm starting to self-censor. Question blog topics. Wonder, 'what if so-and-so reads this?' And that makes blogging decidedly LESS fun.
To be honest, the number of people I meet in random places who are readers of my blog is starting to really really freak me out. Don't get me wrong. I love having people read my blog. It's great motivation to write regularly and blogging helps me to 'think out loud'...vent...and process stuff. It was a huge buzz for me when blog visits topped 18,000 a month. And yeah, it would be a dream come true if one day, thousands more - no make that - MILLIONS of people read my blog. But I want them to be millions of STRANGERS reading my blog. People I will never actually meet in real life.Not people that I bump into at the grocery store. Or stand next to at the buffet table. Or sit next to in church. Which is a problem because I'm Samoan. And I live in the relatively small country of New Zealand. I need to either move to a much bigger country. Or never leave my cave. Or stop blogging.
Is this where I tell you that I'm going to take my blog down? Is that what's going to happen next?
Maybe.
How about you? If you blog - do your family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, fellow grocerystore shoppers know that you blog? What are YOUR challenges with blogging honesty and self-censorship?