I wish everyone had a blog
Like, seriously. I have no power to persuade people to leave mainstream social media to start blogging, so I won't even try, but my desire is strong. I wish everyone had a blog, so far away from algorithmically managed social media. That way, people would be somewhat forced to pay attention, or at the very least more inclined. I don't want to keep up with my friends because a feed reminds me of their existence. I want to keep up with them because either I'm genuinely interested in seeing what they've been doing, or because they had something interesting to say about a movie, a book, a recent trip they took or a visit to a local restaurant. A thought, an idea, a craft. I don't know what the Internet would look like if it were more like Bear and less than Instagram, but I imagine it would feel a bit more positive, smaller, less overwhelming. Surely there would be some thorny stuff I can't really anticipate. But I think I'd love that.
Some of my favourite memories of people I know have to do with their blogs, and because blogging went out of fashion ages ago, these memories are really old. A friend once posted about her team on Pokémon Platinum, detailing each Pokémon she trained and making up a personality for each of them. An acquaintance I knew when I was 13 got into rollerskating and opened a blog dedicated to chronicling her progress with it; a few years after she got really into mountaineering, and now shares her love for trekking and hiking.
There is a vulnerability in blogging, because by using our words, we're not relying on our appearance, which is something we've gotten used to in recent years. We know how to sell ourselves by the proximity to things or people we like, and pictures (whether they're photographs or videos or even slides made with Canvas) can communicate an awful lot of things, but most importantly, they can communicate status. We are so used to placing ourselves on the ladder, and using it to place other people too according to our view of the world. I think blogging changes that.
With blogging, I'm asked to show up and be myself. I'm only as strong, efficient, and captivating as my ideas and my words. And because I'm not used to this kind of social space, I'm still finding my footing. There are some things I'd like to talk about with a post, but I feel like they could be seen as childish, useless, or god knows what else—truly, this is just a projection of my own doubts and vulnerability. At the end of the day, people are free to judge me and my words however they want; my fear of being perceived as less shouldn't stop me from curating a space for myself where I can feel free to express whatever I'd like. I feel like, if more of my friends curated their own space, and if I could follow their journey through life, then I'd feel a bit safer in openly sharing mine.
But here's the crux of the matter: I've been blogging for roughly 10 days and many of my posts have been about blogging. I love it as a topic, and I find it quite interesting, but surely I need to break through this obstacle if I want to use this platform in the most rewarding way. One day, when I'm older and looking back at past posts, I won't be really interested in musings about Bear. I'll probably want to know what 2026-me thought of a film they watched, or a book they read, or a day trip somewhere where grass is lush and there's no buildings in sight. One day, this place will look like more like a diary rather than a log, but somehow I still feel like I need other people to share themselves like this before I get the courage to just do it.