More Meta

Sometimes I want to kick my ass. I have all these pretensions about What My Blog Is. So many, in fact, that I end up writing nothing on here for days, weeks, months sometimes. I feel like I have nothing important to say. I think about those blogs that I skip reading these days because they're so boring to me and wonder, what the hell can I do here that will be interesting?

I've fallen way out of touch with the analytical university stuff that I used to love. Which is understandable; I'm not at uni any more, I don't have to think about it 24/7 whilst juggling a baby/toddler and feeling like I've got something to prove.

But where do we go from here? I've actually been blogging for about 6 years in various places yet I'm still struggling to find my voice. I'm sorta lost amongst so many more interesting people and every now and then I try on a different bloggy-persona but ultimately realise it's not Me. 

There's Serious Blogger who writes about the news and feminism.

There's Mommy Blogger who just wants to show off.

There's Ranty Blogger who is an infernal mixture of the other two (because it's nearly always something to do with Mommy-ing or Feminist-ing that sets me off).

Then there's Me. I'm not any of those things, really. Where actually is my individual voice in all this? I've been trying on all these Blogging Outfits but none of them have really shown who I am. The one I'm closest to is Mrs Ranty, because those posts are normally written from the heart with minimal editing. Someone even chose this one for the defunct Carnival of Feminist Parenting. But still, when I sit down to Do Some Writing I feel like I'm missing my soul.

I guess other people might not really understand where I'm coming from, but writing has always been such an intensely personal part of me. Old diaries would get destroyed when I read them back, embarrassed and shameful and cringing. 

I think I want to embrace that shame, and fight through it. My blogging idol is Wil Wheaton. His work is always personal and unashamed. He shares his love and passion with the whole of geek-dom and geek-dom accepts him as one of their own. That must be a really special feeling, taking that risk and exposing (what you feel are) your weaknesses, only to find people love you for it. What a brave man :) He's recently started talking about The Gap between your aspirations and your production, which is a hugely interesting concept to me, and reminds me of my cringing teenage self, tearing those old diaries apart.

So perhaps I might try it on for size. Writing and writing to bridge that gap between what I produce and who I am. Am I nutty to over-analyse this quite so much? Should I bite the bullet and just trill about the glory of home-education for ever more, leaving the proper writing to people who know what they're doing? Oh damn, I seem to be wrapping this up on a sour note...here, have a picture of a swan in a dress: