It’s happened three times this week – someone has come up to me and said ‘I really enjoy reading your blog’ – or words to that effect. And so three times I have either mumbled something incomprehensible, or alternatively gone into hyper-mega-thousand-words-a-minute mode, or possibly appeared standoffish and ungrateful for the kind words. All figure in my repertoire of ‘how to behave when someone says something nice about your writing’.
Don’t get me wrong. I love it when something I write makes people smile, or makes them think. Actually, I don’t even need the smiling or the thinking, I’ll settle for the knowledge that someone has read a post beginning to end, without giving up and heading back to facebook, or twitter, or wherever they arrived from. I’m self aware enough to know that this desire for some sort of validation or approval forms at least part of the motivation behind LearnerMother. Yes, I want to create a family memory bank, and yes, I love writing, but I could do both of those in a more private fashion.
So given the fact that I have decided to write a public and non-anonymous blog, why does it feel so weird when I meet people who read it, and more weird, people who like it? I really don’t know. I have never been very good at receiving compliments (not enough practice, ka-boom-tish) and clearly it’s not something I’m getting better at as I grow old and grey. But it’s not just the compliment thing. It’s – well, it kind of feels like if you’ve read my blog, you’ve seen me naked, including the saggy stretchy baby pouch, the thread veins and the bunion. So all the bits that I generally don’t show off. I know, I KNOW, this is a massive over reaction since I don’t write anything very private – I’m saving that for my forthcoming anonymous blog, ha! And so far, I have managed to resist the temptation to post while pissed. Though I’ve just realised that’s probably because I don’t ever get to BE pissed any more. Oh god, I’m rambling again. OK. What I wanted to say in this post, was this:
Thank you so much if you take the time to read, and thank you even more if you like what you read, I take it as a HUGE compliment. And also, this: if you say something nice to me on the yard, or on the street, or in work, and I start behaving like a bit of a muppet, please don’t think I’m being stand-offish or arrogant. I just can’t get my head around the fact that people read my shizzle, and I don’t really know what to say, is all.
*Blushes and backs out*
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I can relate to what you’re saying here as there have been a few occasions when people I know have come up to me and mentioned that they’ve been reading my blog. On some occasions, they haven’t really been people I’d have expected to have read it. At a coffee break during a conference, one of the keynote speakers introduced me to another attendee as ‘the author of that blog I was telling you about’. It felt a bit weird but quite amusing too.
That does make you sound quite impressive, mind!
I can completely relate to that too. It’s a little bit weird when friends start talking to me about a particular post they’ve read, but when someone at work mentions my blog to me it freaks me out completely.
Luckily it hasn’t happened to me at work, hoping it stays that way as it would feel too weird!!
It is weird isn’t it? I had the same today and did the blabbing on at a hundred miles an hour bit! Also can relate to the ‘not blogging yet when pissed’! There are certainly things to be said for an anonymous blog. I would certainly let rip about certain things far more than I do on my own blog where anyone who reads it knows who I am. A great post!
I am so glad I am not alone on this!!! Thank you for commenting 🙂