The evils of self-consciousness

Something astonishing has happened. My blog is now being read by more than just me and my brother. Even my smaller half doesn't read my blog, although I suppose I do rush breathlessly up to her as soon as I have posted, giggling and strutting like a pigeon, so she probably doesn't need to.

So I was surprised to see today that there are now at least two (2) other people in the world who have read it. I know this because they left comments! Hmmm, maybe they didn't read it - maybe they just posted coincidentally on-topic remarks without bothering to read my posts. Nevertheless, I feel like Ray Kroc must have when he sold his third burger: I want to put a big sign up at the top of the building saying "Prone To Reverie: now more than 3 readers!" (Note here my arrogant assumption that at least one person out there has feasted on the fruit of my labours and fled like a thief in the night without leaving feedback to thank me...)

The downside of all this is that now I feel like a suddenly famous garage band releasing its second album. (I am aware that there are probably lifestyle differences, but bear with me.) Not only am I pumped up on the excitement of having an Audience, I am also suddenly very self-conscious that people who may not know me very well may read this, and I am eager to impress. It must happen to every blogger at some point.

It's all well and good having my relatives read this babble because they know what I am like. How do I handle people who don't know what I am like? Should I try to impress them with my erudite vocabulary? (See, I used the word erudite.) Should I try to drop some pop culture references like ... okay, so I won't do that, I'm too out of touch. See? Until I overcome this self-consciousness I will be unable to write anything at all, except for agonized soliloquys on self-consciousness. And how dull that would be.

The fundamental problem here is either to figure out why I am writing at all, and write to address that need, or to think "the hell with those readers, they're jerks, they'll read whatever garbage I choose to serve up to them", which seems a little too Rupert Murdoch-esque for my liking. My solution, therefore, is to identify why I am writing.

There are two main reasons I can think of:

1. Ego. I am writing because I would like to think that at least some of what I write will be either funny, insightful or just strange.
2. Procrastination. Let's face it: I really do have better things to do than churn this stuff out. But study is hard, and this is easy. THREE main reasons.
   
3. Writing itself. It was bugging me that I kept having thoughts about stuff that 5 minutes later would float off into the ether and vanish. Now I can post it here and, just maybe, something of worth has been captured for a time, and people reading it will think, "hey yeah!"
   

This leads us to you, Dear Reader. Factor 1 (ego) requires that you provide feedback wherein you sing my praises. Factor 2 (procrastination) requires no participation on your part unless you too are doing this to procrastinate, in which case I say "Shame on you! Procrastination is the thief of time!", and invite you to procrastinate further by leaving feedback. Factor 3 (writing itself) requires that you provide feedback if and when I have something interesting to say, or I have managed to say something uninteresting in a stylish way.

Meanwhile, just like the suddenly famous garage band's second album, this blog has just got way too po-mo and self-referential for my liking. Normal service to resume shortly.