Blogging is slowly becoming the one thing everyone wants to do. We can even humiliate ourselves by borrowing a friend’s internet connection, stealing articles of other people’s web pages, or simply chronicling our frustrations into satisfying globs of paragraphs until they make complete sentences, or are lined up like obedient but ugly ducklings into a piece that only its author can be proud of.
Some have been impressed by the advent of CMS (content management systems) believing that such capabilities would directly influence the deficiencies of their pieces, or maybe add that flowery flame that their vapid articles failed to generate in the reader barely snagged for all of that fifteen seconds it takes to see through the “borrowed” and cliché-drunk headlines. These fellows pursue the failed dream or battered hope that the picturesque themes they painstakingly picked would improve their chances of being appreciated; they stand the same chance poop has of being eaten just because it is served in a huge, white porcelain bowl.
They are swindled by the growing abilities of users to access the web via mobile devices, which naturally extends the reach of anyone willing to detain a domain name and append whatever is itching their fancy at the time of the domain acquisition. They believe the staggering statistics behind their pages, induced into greater moments of pain and gain, or so they equate the per-click data which tells them the sheer number of visitors to their house but never tells them how many were actually affected by the drapes or impacted by the gastronomy.
However, a genial few protect their fragile ego with blogs that don’t allow comments, brandishing the excuse that they do it for the art, and would never allow pessimistic critics to smear their skill with harmful bile, or use their proactive vehicles to distribute negativism. In their flash of genius, they forget that blogs are meant for others to appreciate or depreciate, and can only be evaluated by the world wallowing in variety.
Conversely, there is that select group of bloggers who blow you away with their creativity, tapping into their milky way for such materials as draw upon your soul. They cook up such exquisite meals, dishes that make you succumb to the desire for a second, third and fourth helping, till you come for you the thirteenth read and find a completely dry well, or an argument if a well is artesian or aqueduct. They simply throw away reliability, forgetting that a restaurant’s special dish is, yes, special, but it can never replace the delightful cereal we spoon up every morning.
Whatever blogging is, and I’m sorry if you were deluded into thinking I have mastered the art, I’m still working on getting to Never-Never-Land; heck, even the king of pop was declaring “this is it” just before he passed, hinting he hadn’t found it either. But you can bet I know some of the things that it is not, though I have only waddled through some of the mess out there, hence my saying I know some of what it is not.
I have the faint idea that it is meant to be fun, creative and compelling. It is intended to educate with the ease of a novel, getting us to learn without the strictures imposed by the 600-page textbook, and also breeding the simple abandon we feel when we take a favorite paperback or newspaper to the loo with us. It is meant to continue, generating a progressive source of information that engenders consistent following, that traps the reader in a habit that though may end up being destructive, gets them walking into that scorching light with a smile sweetly infested with dimples.
Now that’s blogging.
