I originally thought that 90% of bloggers would choose to read over write. Then I continued to think about it as I stared at this blank space with only a link intruding upon its white and it came to me that the percentage of those choosing to blog over reading blogs would actually be the higher percentage. Those who blog, even anonymously, do so because they want people to read their writing, their thoughts, their facts and feelings. It takes a bit of narcissism to be a writer and/or blogger. So I am going to be the statistic. The one who chooses to write over read.
To be a great writer, you have to be a great reader. To be a great reader, you don’t have to be a great writer. In any medium you choose to write, you have interests in reading. If you’re a newspaper columnist or journalist, you take interest in reading other journalists and columnists. If you’re an author, you take interests in reading other authors. Are there exceptions? Are there those who can be writers that take no interest in reading in the medium they choose to write? Of course. They are their biggest competition and inspiration. They enjoy their own writing and don’t choose to read in their medium because they don’t want to pick up another’s voice.
I would choose to write/blog over reading blogs. In my opinion, blogging even about recipes or movies and never about yourself, is still very personal because it’s your voice. You have to be careful when reading other bloggers that you don’t begin to mimic their style/voice. I need escapism and I love to write. I don’t have to read blogs in order to blog though. I can read magazines and books, news articles (yeah right*) and poetry.
I love all of you, but I would choose my blog over yours. Don’t shake your head at me, I know you’d do the same.
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*So I have already discussed in a previous post on why I don’t follow the news, but I recently tried reading an article that caught my attention and it was about the boy at the Pittsburgh zoo whose mother held him up at the railing of the African Painted dog pit and he lunged forward and she couldn’t get ahold of him in time to keep him from falling in and was killed by the dogs. Heartbreakingly tragic, but the kicker of it and why I kept staring at the first paragraph is because it stated that the child believed there was Plexiglas barrier to protect him. The child was 2 years old. I don’t know if that line was coming from the journalist or what as it wasn’t very clear, but I have some questions. 1.) How does a 2 year old know about safety? 2.) How does a 2 year old know about Plexiglas? 3.) How can you tell me what the child was thinking at that time? To me it would have been “I want to pet the puppies!”, but I still wouldn’t be sure. I know it’s tragic, I could never go through something as losing a child, I’d be a fucking wreck, but where the hell was her common sense?? She’s not being charged, but the prosecutor is now figuring out if they can go after the zoo. The zoo should have had some damn signs up with a line through a woman holding up her kid at the railing.
