Futility

As days and months go by, each of my posts is met with a rare couple of comments from dedicated readers. I know each time who they'll be, and I go back time and time again to see if those few have been by to check it out and give me their opinions or advice.

It's becoming increasingly difficult for me to wait.

For the most part, it goes back to why it is we DO this goofy blog thing. Who's it for? There are so many tens of thousands out there, and who do I think I am that others will want to read mine? What makes me think anyone will find mine any more interesting than the other 85 thousand and want to read it? I'll tell you what. Absolutely nothing.

So what's the point? I read others. I read Absentminded Housewife, Dooce, Hundred Reasons Why I Hate My Husband, File To Fit, Paint To Match, Razors Back, Waiterrant.net, sometimes Horsetail Snake and Mindless Dribbler. Occasionally I jump to other blogs through links and come back again. Three of those occasionally read mine. Two of them are commentors.

I GET something out of the others. Two of the blogs I read, Waiterrant.net, and Dooce are self-sufficient blogs. They actually pay for themselves, and are on their own servers. One of them, Waiter, has been offered a book deal. I'm not surprised. Dooce has been offered a regular spot on another blog. Again, not surprised. These people are GOOD.

I'm missing something.

There's a friend I talk to regularly in a different forum who tells me all the time that I'm a writer. I argue, she tells me again. My final argument, and the one she can't really dispute, is that it's simply too hard! My mother was a writer and I know just how much effort goes into it. So forget it, I am NOT a writer. She laughs. She sees a different side of me. But you know, if I truly WAS a writer, I'd have more than three or four people reading a blog that's been on the internet for nine months. For all she says, for all she might like reading what I put on HER site, she hasn't been able to pinpoint why it is there are only three or four readers who have come back here with any regularity to discover what havoc the LRHM has wreaked today, or how BPD or bipolar disorder has affected my family or day-to-day life this week.

Does it matter? Or maybe they're just bored. It's not funny anymore.

I guess it comes down to why I write, or for whom. It started out being an exercise for ME, and ended up being a test, of sorts. After watching others thrive, my competitive nature took over and I decided that I, too, must take off! Alas, it hasn't happened. Now, as is a natural part of my personality, I'd rather quit than keep seeing the 0 in the comments column that I equate to Failure.

All part and parcel of the Borderline personality that tells me I'm not good enough; that simply doing something for me will never be enough, because if it doesn't get validation from someone else, it doesn't MEAN anything. That's how I live my life, and the way my brain functions. Regular thought processes don't count. Average isn't a part of me. It's got to be the best or it's garbage. My shoes, my clothing, my writing, the way I treat my husband, the way I talk to my therapist, how I raise my kids, even the number of games I win on the internet. Living life this way gets tiring. And expensive. I have the shoes and purses to prove it. There's never been a sale I didn't like. Hey! there's a great name for a blog ...