From Dawn Till Dusk
Sunday, June 8, 2008
“To each it’s own”. This short captive phrase best describes the fact how Blogging is different to a diverse of Bloggers in cyberspace. Like many others who have already shared their views, I too have my humble personal Blogging perspective to share. I have been writing - business news writing to be more particular - as a way of living for 10 years or so, and perhaps, the extent of experiences and exposures I gained through this profession naturally made it flexibly easy for me to adapt to the world of Blogging.
But acquainting through the existence of Blogging in cyberspace was a different story. To be honest, I never even knew there was such a thing back in 2006. Yes, you heard it right. It was only in July last year when I discovered there exists a thing in cyberspace. Call me dumb or ignorant. But the truth is, if it wasn’t for Friendster Friends who then had their respective Friendster Blogs, I never would have stumbled upon Blogging and be inspired to create one for myself.
Updated that I am through email notifications containing links to my Friendster Friends’ notebooks on the Internet, I see them as they travel through places. It seems like we are just neighbors as I know where they’ve been to even as we are miles apart. I smell the aroma of the coffee they drank as photos and videos vividly illustrate them through the use of multimedia sharing sites. I hear them as they speak their thoughts and I feel them as they share their happiness, fears, pains and even sorrows. And as more email notifications and links I get, the more I bookmarked them for regular visits. In a sense, I was getting hints and starting to learn how to do the Blogging thing as I condition myself to start my own.
And though I had hints, I found it necessary to seek traditional references like dictionaries for an acceptable definition of the word Blog. I wanted to be clear on the phenomena and the mechanics on how one has to do it. I stumbled upon the ever reliable Merriam Webster that then declared Blog as the Famous Word in the Dictionary for 2005 and it says, “a Blog is an online personal journal”. Quite simple definition as one may see. But examining further through the three-word definition, I view it peculiar. “I just don’t get the meaning. How can a journal (and personal at that) be in an online platform with the whole wide world seeing it? Isn’t it supposed to be a very private thing? I mean, I do keep a diary, but it’s all locked up. Not even my Mom (who I knew frequently peeks at my private writings) can obligate me to open up my diary with her and my Dad.” And my questions go on and on, one after another.
But then I was reminded, “Hmm, I kept memories online too, did I?” Then I remembered my husband and I had a very plain website in Geocities called Jun and Feng’s Special Day. Nothing fanfare with it though. It was a site created for families and relatives and friends (who weren’t present in the D-Day) to see. And when I became pregnant with my first born, I grabbed the opportunity to journal my thoughts and reflections. I called it My Pregnancy Chronicles housed in BabyZone for some seven months.
“Where those in a way, part of Blogging too? I had my share of spaces in the World Wide Web, but these are kept private and mostly for families and friends to show”. After a good thought, I knew the answers myself and started Blogging all the way-quickly, as families and friends from miles apart wished to comfort my bereaved family with the passing away of my dearest father in June of 2006. I wanted them to know and be comforted on how painful it was to lose someone so dear, someone who gave me my life. No words can compensate the pain we are having, but nevertheless, I want them to comfort us in anyway they can through my Blog.
The next I knew, I found myself hooked in Blogging about the things that matter to me most -my thoughts and reflections on the multi roles that I play in life - as a wife, as a family member, as a worker in the corporate world, as a friend, and most importantly as a Mother to a budding Little Angel who gave more meaning in my life. That explains why I stood to have minimal categories in my Blog as I tagged them based mostly on the different hats I wear in life.
From Friendster, I moved to Wordpress with an aim to maximize the benefits of more flexibility and most importantly, for more security. Thanks to my Mommy Friends at Pinoy Moms Network, I realized these benefits right away.
Blogging has been the freest form of expression for me to unleash the deepest of thoughts I have within. It was more than art, it was also a form of science of building relationships in the world wide web. It was way ahead more fulfilling than writing straight business news articles that’s so stiff and has to meet certain canons of journalism and newspaper standards. While business news writing has to be backed up with so many statistical details (in my case, I was the account officer for international trade which dealt with ASEAN, AFTA, WTO, fair trade, smuggling, dumping, exports, imports, safeguard measures, tariffs), Blogging on the other hand was more enjoyable as it expresses just my thoughts, wanderings, musings, and rants on everyday facts of life. In a sense, it was more of feelings and opinions, just thinking out loud as they say.
The best part however about Blogging, with which my writing for a living cannot totally provide is to think out loud and yet getting straight answers and opinions in return. News and photo releases and opinion feeds that get their way in the newspapers would bring our organization some P2-million or more in advertising equivalencies or so number of media impressions, yet these are all figures.
In Blogging, even if there’s one or two readers commenting on one of my particular entry, I’m happy because I know that someone out there is lending me an ear. For me, just the thought of expressing my feelings out would definitely be exhilarating already (and unburdening of my loads whenever I have problems), what more fulfillment there is when getting feedbacks in return.
My approach in writing entries is quite long though, an average of two or three pages for a draft in MSWord with the Arial font at 12 points, I think. This is the very reason why I titled my online journal as “From Dusk Till Dawn” because I often write from the beginning to its ending, good enough with so many paragraphs to almost be classified as a novel. But no matter how much I write these posts in detail, it still doesn’t exactly reflect my very life from within. Thus, the sub title “A Glimpse of a Day in My Life” in my online journal. I see it as merely something likened to the surface of an ocean, you only see the waves as they move, but not that living things from that deep of the salt water. With this said, I am disclaiming, and hoping I am not judged by readers solely on what’s written in my diary.
Likened to a hierarchy of personalities, my Blog is not a celebrity at all in the Blogsphere. No citations, no awards, not even a domain name that’s catchy enough for readers to easily recall. But I do have my own measuring stick to still be stuck in the Blogging world for as long as I can, until the Great Creator tells me to stop.
Everytime I received words of complements from readers, these are highlights in my Blogging effort. With all humbleness, there are a number of readers whose lives have been touched by making the entries in my Blog as sources of learning and wisdom.
One was from a concerned officemate of a Mother whose son had a heart anomaly. I have no idea on how she bumped into my journal, it’s never important that I asked. She stumbled upon my entry regarding how we triumphed over my son’s congenital heart problem and aiming to be of help to her officemate, she asked for advices on what medical opinion the family can resort to so as to save the life on an innocent child. That entry became the channel for me and the Mom to email one another and exchange words of comfort. I would always say to Mommy T (that’s how I called her in my recent entry) to remain steadfast because “more than us the parents, it is Him to gave us our child, cared even more”. Now, Mommy T is never giving up, still hoping that God will do a miracle for her Baby (whom from our last exchange of email was at already 5 kilos at 3 months) as what I myself proved at how faith and prayers can move mountains as the these were the very reasons the hole in my son’s heart miraculously closed by itself. Since then I’ve decided to solicit for prayers towards the progress to wellness of Baby T and responses from Blog readers were overflowing.
Next to what can be considered as another highlight so far were testimonies from two couples (both are now happily married) who made frequent visits from a post I wrote about how my husband and I dealt with inevitable changes in our relationship. The first couple was a college friend who commented that he and the wife can very well relate with the marital problems we had back then, and that they were inspired to do the same way as my husband and I did, to compromise - as it is said in the post, "it’s a matter of dealing with it, because often, it is when changes don’t go our way that we get disturbed." The second couple is long time steadies, the girl (who is now a happy yet learning wife) was back then having second thoughts on marrying her boyfriend of seven years. Predictability of the significant other’s change in attitude towards the prolonged existence of their relationship made it hard for her to decide. But then she confessed through an email to me saying she was inspired with what I said in my post. She took courage and accepted the fact that the only constant in a relationship is change and they should brave these changes together. The next thing she told in her email, she was already married to the same person. She followed the stories of my life to the present time she has now a baby. She emailed me again as I post some Mother’s Day woes and I tried answering her innocent but thought provoking questions on how I deal with an imperfect spouse. She loved it much as my Mommy friends from Pinoy Moms Network loved the post though exchange of experiences and thoughts.
At some points in Blogging, I somehow regret posting those entries as I could be accused of “washing my dirty laundry in front of the house”. But on the other hand, unsolicited comments from these readers ceased that regret. I’d say it’s but natural to confess difficulties in marriage, for as long as you write it fairly, truthfully and with respect to the better half. Because let’s face it, life has its share of spices equivocal to happiness. In a sense, I am Blogging too with a purpose for my readers-to be a Wisdom Blogger. In that way, we learned lessons through reading worthwhile posts that we need not experienced these challenges for us to learn lessons in life. And if I may add, this post, now matter how old it is stored in the Being a Better Half category of my Blog, is still the number one entry with the most number of hits in my Wordpress Blog Stats.
Finally, I say that my membership with the Pinoy Moms Network was one of the best decisions I’ve made. It was the very way I knew my Mommy Friends who has been the source of inspiration for me to be a better Mom I could be for my son. For me, joining the network was sort of a therapy, allowing me to share my qualms and fears in mommyhood and knowing that many Mommies out there in cyberspace are more than willing and ready to listen, to comfort me, and advice me with sort of words like: “Hey, you’re not alone. I went through those mommy experiences myself”. I realized that motherhood is such overwhelming that is liked to be shared with others, especially these are the people are those who share a common interest with you.
In a matter of four months, I will be nearing my first year in the Blogging world. I knew where I am best at (mostly on sharing views about parenting) but I’d still wished to find out other niches in Blogging where I can share my thoughts. I don’t know what that niche is yet, but I am about to discover it. Maybe something related to work? I can only imagine for now.
There are offers too for to earn from Blogging. And I say, why not grab them? Something they called monetizing your blog through Ad Sense, Text Link Ads, Pay Per Post, Review Me, Blogvertise, and many others. I’m considering them in a way, but not in the immediate future. My dilemma now is a thought that earning through Blogging would make the quality of my regular posts suffer, thus, it explains why I don’t have advertisements in my Blog just yet. Or maybe, I’d grab the opportunity to earn if I decide to buy my own domain name so that the ads would compensate for my expenses. That is if I decide to go a step further in the ladder of professional blogging which is far from being at the moment.
For the time being, I’d like my Blog to stay the way it is. Even if it takes just me in the end, exclusively reading my online personal journal and a little less people reading it. Just being the cyber me, documenting and sharing thoughts as the real life in me happens. Blogging it, and most importantly, living it!
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Labels: Fine Art of Blogging
posted by Shirazi @ 6:00 PM,
3 Comments:
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At 22:47,
Skeptic said...
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Thanks Cubano for your comment on my Blog. I am going outstation tomorrow so I may not be able to Blog for a week or two but I stumbled upon your blog through bloggers.pk and I must say that you have got a wonderful blog and you also have a good insight on this phenomena of blogging.
It is indeed a paradox that why would a person publish one’s private affairs on one’s public journal? Aristotle said that man is a political being. By which he probably meant that man is a social being. In Urdu language we have a phrase “Insaan haiwaan-e-naatiq hai.” It means that man is a kind of an animal who talks. Talking and all other forms of expression is our nature. And blogging no doubt is one of the best form of self-expression. Thus I would infer that blogging is human nature :) -
At 10:02,
said...
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This tale does touch the heart. Nice.
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At 00:24,
SexyMom said...
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congratulations, Feng, for your post in Quasi Fictional. you have touched the hearts of so many through your candid blogging, i am sure you will be able to touch more hearts now.
and yes, PinoyMomsNetwork has indeed gone a long way.
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Fine Art Claimer
My blogs are a resource for my writings. More often, I blog informally, sharing impressions, generating ideas to see how they invoke reactions, keeping track of others’ work in the fields of my interest, or simply ranting or pointing out things that come to my attention.
Also, I use blogging as a platform to prune ideas. This is where I meet others and share experiences. “I am neither geek, nor nerd, I am not a hacker, a phreaker, a programmer or any variety of technoid dweeb.”
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