Fading Into the Background

In case there's anyone out there who still visits blogs, rather than reading feeds from blogs, you've already noticed that I've gone minimalist on my blog layout.

For those of you reading this in your reader, there's no real point in visiting my blog to see it for yourself, since the whole point of going minimalist means that there's nothing to see here.

Really, this outward change in appearance accurately reflects the way I feel on the inside: plain, simple, not flashy, searching for the important core components of existence, shedding the complex and the showy.

Frankly, I'm happy about this. I know that the written word doesn't always convey tone, so I just figured I'd make that clear. I'm not feeling drab or trying to be pretentious.

Though I haven't published anything on this blog for a month, I've actually written some stuff. But I can never seem to finish what I start or allow myself to be satisfied with "good enough". I'm back to the same old conundrum that I arrive at pretty regularly -- undecided about why I'm writing or to whom I'm writing. Different bloggers have different advice on what works for them, and I've not only listened to this advice and taken it to heart, I've pondered it deeply, and deconstructed it to the point of paralysis. Which ironically, would also be an accurate description of how I've processed most of the other information that has found its way into my cerebral cortex in the last few days, or weeks, or months, or years.

I'm thinking of maybe trying one of those "post every day for a month" or "post every day for a year" things, like Jim has been doing. I do have thoughts almost every day that might be interesting to look back on at some point in the future. I also love my community of online friends who regularly meet "virtually" around the blogosphere. It seems that actually writing a "blog" would make me a better "blogger", and hence a better member of the "blogosphere".

I could do a lot more with this, too, but honestly have no desire to do that. I know how to cull accurate statistics of web site visits. In my professional life, I've set up dozens (if not hundreds) of web servers, manipulated the server log data at the most basic level, and have installed a wide variety of web statistics programs for years. I know all the tricks to get "noticed" by a larger audience, how to create content that is attractive to important search engines like Google and Technorati, how to use social networking sites, and on and on. Perhaps it's my past and present professional involvement in such internet marketing that makes me not want to do any of that for this blog.

So maybe I'll try writing again, or try writing regularly, or try committing to something, or try to stop writing long sentences with lots of commas and repetitive coordinating conjunctions. That last one certainly seems like a noble goal.