Comments on: What’s Blogging Worth?

By: Larry Hunsucker

Larry Hunsucker — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 18:26:47 +0000

Fred, it must have some purpose, because I check it every day I’m in the office, and have been for quite a while. So it means something to me, something different from day to day, but something worth refreshing.

lgh

By: Bruce

Bruce — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:32:35 +0000

I enjoy reading your blog almost daily and hope you continue. I don’t comment often, but find your perceptions of the natural world and rural life to be entertaining and inspiring.

By: Kathy

Kathy — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 03:37:43 +0000

I wish I had thought of that phrase: window into your world. That is what your blog has been to me these last few years. I have treasured having it, so that lets me know how much I treasure the Appalachia I left 40 years ago this month. Thank you for blogging!
Furthermore, your book directly resulted from your blog, and it enriched your life and many others. I predict the blog will greatly support your next creative doings, too.

By: Lorianne

Lorianne — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:08:21 +0000

Gosh, Fred…if I blogged only on those days when I felt like I had something “worthwhile” to say or share, I’d hardly ever post anything. How can you know if something is has “value” to people until you’ve shared it with them? One man’s blog banality is another man’s treasure. I say blog it all & let the readers sort wheat from chaff.

By: Mike Nichols

Mike Nichols — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:39:47 +0000

Why does something that one enjoys always have to have a “purpose?” It’s that Puritanical notion that our country was built on: everything has to be “improving the time” or it’s sinful, wasteful, slothful, or all three.

None of the highest, best things in life have, or can have, a price tag attached. Love for love’s sake, art for art’s sake, and if I may mongrelize things a bit, blogging for blogging’s sake. You do not need to have a purpose for writing, or any reward other than the satisfaction of writing. You do not need to have a reason for including one of your photos; that it is a representation of the beauty in your world is enough.

I enjoy your blogs daily, whether they are highly structured essays or simple ramblings. Each is a privileged window into your world, and valuable to you and to me for being so.

By: colleen

colleen — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:08:20 +0000

I have the same mixed feelings you do, Fred. When the feeling of ‘what am I doing and what’s the point?’ comes up, I just take a break that day and wait until I come up with something I feel good about having on the front page. I keep telling myself that the source is eternal and that I’m not running myself dry. We are pretty deep into it to cut the cord now, I think. It does become harder when readership drops in the summer, since we are taught that everything must keep growing like the profits and the economy.

I like Rob’s point of view: Why do artists sketch?

Nice to meet you, Nancy.

By: Nancy

Nancy — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:45:44 +0000

I love reading your blog and Colleen’s blog every chance I get. You two have created a vision of Floyd that sounds like a wonderful place to live and express yourself creatively. Please don’t stop.
Besides, anyone who admired Dr. George Folkerts is OK in my book!
Nancy from Alexander City, AL

By: pablo

pablo — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:29:20 +0000

I’ve had very similar thoughts, but I try not to let myself think them. My blogging is an extension of my journaling of a past life. I’ve kept hand-written journals for nearly 30 years, and blogging seems a natural adjunct to that. Do I write for myself or for those few readers that happen by? I certainly wasn’t writing in those journals for other people to see. I try not to think about that. I know I have a compulsion of sorts to write. That’s about all I want to know.

By: fred

fred — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 10:59:48 +0000

Morning, Rob!

Window into my life? I’d like to think so in the vacuum of personal interaction my rather reclusive existance has become.

For a couple of years, the book and related engagements made me feel, well, engaged–in ways I don’t today. The blog also gave that sense of connectedness in its first few years, but now not so much, because I have changed and the realm of blogs and blog readers have changed. I’ve not worked very hard to swim with the current, and sometimes I regret this.

Blogging for me is necessary journaling. Sometimes it seems pathetic that the weblog represents such a major part of my self-expression, for want of very much adult contact or conversation in person.

Other times, I’m very thankful for it–as a dynamic and current personal business card and memoirist window into a life.

Is the blog a step on a path toward some place worth going, or only the act of taking each day the next step without the destination in sight or mind?

By: Rob Paterson

Rob Paterson — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 10:40:41 +0000

I blog because I have too…
Last week my Typepad site blew up for a few days and I could not blog … felt terrible

I think I do it for me and it’s nice that a few people drop by.

Why do artists sketch?

Why do gardeners garden?

Is life all about functional activity anyway?

Please don’t go away Fred …because some people also like to have a window into your life