Blog Friends

My grandfather recently asked me to try and explain what a blog is and why people would do it. He wanted to know what people get out it and how long I thought that I would do it for. Who reads a blog, he asked and what do they get out of it.

I told him that if he was interested I’d help him start his own blog. At 94 he’d be one of the oldest bloggers. It’d be a nice gimmick, maybe even land him a book deal and make him rich. He laughed and told me that he wasn’t going to do anything to improve my inheritance beyond the $8.73 he had already bequeathed to me. And then he said that I needed to answer the questions he asked.

So I rattled off a few stock answers and decided to create a short blog post about this. My apologies if some of this is redundant, I’ll try to provide new material.

I blog for myself. It is an outlet for my thoughts and feelings. It is a place where I record some funny experiences/stories about my children. If it paved the way for a book deal I’d be grateful. It is not why I blog, but I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t interested.

But here is one of the best things that blogging has done for me. I have made a number of new friends. My blog friends are as important to me as my “real world” friends. In fact, the reality is that there are things that my blog friends know about my that my “real world” friends do not.

It may be a little different than a traditional friendship. We may not have had the chance to meet in person. We may not have shared a meal or gone to school together, but we have shared experiences.

We have traveled down a rocky road, climbed hills and walked into the valley. We have seen the good and the bad. You have been there in the tough times as well as the good and I am grateful to call you my friend.

Thank you for this, it means more than I can properly convey.

• Saved: Blogging