I don’t follow many blogs. My schedule is pretty full, both with things I need to do and things I want to do.  Therefore, if you want my attention, you’d better be able to entertain me.  You can see the list of blogs I follow over on the right.

Lately, I’ve been falling behind in my “loyal reader” duties.  I’ve spent my downtime over the past couple of days catching up on all of the unread posts stacked up in my Google Reader.  One of them in particular, though, caught my attention.  It was a post from Nancy’s F8HASIT blog called “Obscurity Bliss.” I ended up reading it twice.

My blog has evolved over the past several years.  I started out blogging on my MySpace page (back when MySpace was cool and everyone had one).  I’ve always loved writing, and realistically, if I was any good at it and capable of producing quality content on a consistent basis (and make any money in the process), I would do it as a profession and be perfectly content.  I then moved my blog to my website, which I maintained in various forms over the past few years.  Finally, I lost interest in maintaining a website and moved my blog here so I could just focus on the part I really enjoyed.

Looking back over my posts over the years, there are a lot of memories there.  I can see how I met my best friends… started dating my now-fiancee… moved… taken on new jobs… laughed… cried… bitched… and everything in between.  Over the years, though, you can see a change in my blogging style as well.  I don’t really have a lot of readers.  I greatly appreciate those who do take the time to read my stuff, but you’re never going to see this little blog of mine in a magazine or anything.  And I’m cool with that.

I did start to develop some readers, though.  And as I did so, I started to wonder “what is my audience going to think about this?”  When I first started, I just said pretty much whatever I wanted to say.  Later on, though, I began to “censor” myself a little.

In her blog, Nancy describes the same type of thing.  Putting down thoughts, then editing them in order to avoid pissing anyone off or losing readers.

Now, it’s natural that things would change some.  I mean, we all change as time goes one.  We grow up a little every year, learn new things, etc.  And when you put something out on the Internet, you need to remember that anyone in the world has the ability to find it and read it.  Your parents… your boss… your friends.  That’s why I’m kind of glad I have such a small following.  As Nancy so nicely puts it:

If you’re huge, with a gazillion followers, your social network could possibly generate revenue. But if you’re small, you’re just chatting with pals.

Obscurity can be beneficial.

Because you’re not talking at people, but with people.

That’s not just cool, that’s awesome.

I love that more.

It’s nice to be somewhat obscure, hiding in the shadows so as to not be judged. But known enough in certain circles that your thoughts don’t fall on deaf ears. It’s a big world out there. Overwhelming in scope.

But it’s you guys…my BlogBuds; it’s the banter, the comments, the camaraderie, the connection with those that I’d not had if not for this blog…

That’s what makes all this (gesturing at the web site) worthwhile.