What's in a blog?

Since this is my first blog post I thought it would be interesting to talk about blogging... a phenomenon that has taken the internet by storm. I mostly started thinking about it because of an article a friend forwarded me about Meghan Baker and the power of blogging.

Meghan Baker started her blog “The Bees Knees” when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Over the course of her treatments, which included chemotherapy and a mastectomy she chronicled her life. She talked about the treatments, her emotional ups and downs, her relationship with her family and of course her relationship with her husband. Her and her husband met in South Korea while teaching English. When they returned to North America ready to start their lives together, she was diagnosed with cancer.

As I flipped through her blog posts I felt like I was meeting a new friend. A friend who had fallen on hard times, but was hopeful and always smiling. I got to know her, her quirks and the people who mattered most in her life. I am sure her readers felt the same, checking back daily or weekly to see how she was doing. After her death her husband established a foundation in her name. People donated to help him accomplish the list of 30 things Meghan wanted to do in her life.

What is it that draws us to one person's story over another? Blogging has become the modern way of storytelling. A mix of voyeurism and self-indulgence. I mean really: what's it like to be you? Or maybe it's more: I feel this way, do you?

Social scientists say those who blog are trying to fulfill a person’s ultimate desires: to express your identity, to create a community, and make sense of your experiences. So why do we read blogs? Perhaps it’s about being allowed to enter into a world we only thought we knew about. Like the relationship between Meghan and her husband. The idea of strength and the story that comes along with a love that has been tried and stays strong. Perhaps it’s a form of group therapy, of knowing we are not alone, and lifting each other up to achieve something greater. Or maybe it’s just to understand one another; to see where I come from; to see where you are going.

My high school English teacher and my dearest mentor always told me 'write what you know'. And maybe that's what blogging is.

So here I go.