Blog slammers of the world, untie!

Oh wow. Just read a shocking blog slam. I’m not linking to the site, nor will I say which blog it was about because I simply don’t want to promote either one, but I will say that the blog that was slammed (including a particularly brutal attack on the writer, not just the content) is one that I read nearly every day. I love it’s happiness, quirkiness, and pick-me-up-ness.

The blog slammer had valid points, to be sure, but was mean in a very well put together diatribe as well as very encouraging of commenters who shared the same feeling and the same brutality (I’m all for free speech and free blogging and the like, but I don’t agree with using those rights/privileges to promote meanness).

The blog writer was attacked for being… yes, hold your breath for this now… being happy.

For writing about happy.

Here’s why this was a gut wrencher. A lot of media out there is about how horrible things are. So much of our TV programming is in the realm of reality shows (where have our creative writers gone?). Many in our society tend to love looking at how horribly people can act and how shallow we’ve become. In my opinion, it’s a waste of time to watch that crap. It’s like spending all of our free time watching soap operas; basically, you can come back 20 years later to the same show and things are still…the same. When do we grow?

I don’t write a lot about really down and dirty stuff on this blog. If Hank and I are stinking it up in our relationship and on the verge of meltdown, it’s not here. It’s not your business, and it certainly would not be my place to air my grievances, or his for that matter, in this forum. What would that promote? Hurt. Distrust. Brokenness. Completely inappropriate for us. Again, how would we grow from that?

I write about, and take pictures of, the day-to-day. And my practice is to look at the positive parts and share them. Originally, this blog was intended for our families to watch our children be themselves in their daily routine, unscripted, unstaged, as a way to bridge all of the miles of distance between us. It’s an affordable way to “travel,” if you will. I realize it’s grown to be more than that, therefore, the blog has shifted and will most likely continue to do so.

I never once thought that writing about our family could come across as arrogant, or ego-filled, or anything but authentic (I haven’t personally been accused of this, but now I wonder, in an “oh no!” way, if anyone thinks that? Please don’t!). Am I authentic here? Yes. Have I disclosed our entire lives in an authentic way? No. And I won’t. I don’t want to stay in the unhealthy parts of any relationship. What I will do periodically is talk about lessons learned after the fact, but only with the intention of promoting growth or hopes of inspiring someone else, and who even knows who reads this stuff, that there is light at the end of a similar tunnel, or this too shall pass, or insert-here another cliche of truth to get us all going forward. I write about what inspires me.

Do I share doldrum days? Low patches? Being uninspired? Feeling unhappy and stagnant? Yep. But again, not too much on here. I’ve lived in a life that became much too comfortable with staying in the “what’s wrong about my life” space and found it personally poisonous. I read a book during that time titled, “Love is a Decision,” and while I didn’t agree with all of it, the title and its premise surely made me think. Sometimes, it is a decision to love. Sometimes, it is a decision to be happy. I can get pretty riled up about some stuff and be feisty with my language about it, which goes right into being hurtful to others. It’s a weakness; I can be hot-headed and quick to blame, and I work on it all of the time. Not proud of that part of my personality, and I decide not to go there very often by employing some different techniques I’ve learned along the way. I hope, hope, that I’m getting better about dealing with stuff more quickly as it comes up, learning what I can take from it to do it better next time, and move into some goodness in a constructive, not destructive, way.

I will challenge myself to be more authentic as a person, yet discretionary as a blogger.

How’s that? That feels doable. Actually, that feels safe, to be completely real.

I don’t receive a lot of comments here (and no, I’m not trying to feed an ego; I can see how much traffic the site gets and that’s a nice enough validation for me – ha! see? authentic! pffft!), but I am interested to know what kind of blogs other people like and why. Happy ones? Ones that share tribulation and triumph? Cause-based ones? Ones about beer and bikes only (Hank’s favorite)? Gossip blogs? Politics? I have a smattering of ones that I follow, too. Big range, and I pick through them, depending on my mood.

Oh, and for the record, Hank and I saw the most hilarious bumper sticker once that said, “Dyslexics of the world, untie!” So funny (and no, not in a derogatory way). But for the title of this post? I’d really like to see blog slammers unravel.

Rant over.

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