Tuesday 10 September 2013

Blog

In January 2007 I had my heel removed, realigned and reattached with a Titanium screw. It was encased in plaster and I was left with almost four months to discover what life was like for people who are housebound. My hospitalisation and encarcerationgave me a rich seam of experience that itched for want of someone to share my thoughts with. 

I started this blog and inadvertently, and by increments, became an avid user and consumer of a range of social media. 

Reading back over my posts now is like finding an old diary or sketch book. I smiled at memories of funny and interesting things that populated my life for the years I blogged regularly. Yes, years. My blogging continued well after my recovery, and actually for a while became part of my job. I wrote my boss's blog and advised others on blogging. 

The nature of social media is that it never rests - constantly churning and evolving to meet the changing whims of an audience addicted to easy fixes of information (or does that framing betray my getting older and ever so slightly out-of-touch?). I lost interest in my blog - it took time to craft a piece of writing and seconds to Tweet.

Social media is now an integral part of the communications industry, every business or organisation must be accessible by a range of channels. 

So where does that slick professionalisation leave my little blog? Does it matter that sometimes only half-a-dozen people read what I had written - was it worth all that effort?

Even now, years after I shared my various and sundry experiences, someone living 10 or 10, 000 miles away will occasionally pop a comment on one of my posts to say they had stumbled across it in a Google search and my experience resonated with their own. 

Hooray for the Internet that gives us the freedom to express ourselves, like any heart wrenching, hand written journal entry, yet allows each of us to reach out to, who knows where, and who knows who.

With possibly more time on my hands to come perhaps the time is right to reacquaint myself with Crofty's Blog. 


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