Missing

Sometimes over dinner with the Partner, I will bring up something one of my favorite bloggers said. From the context, it'll sound almost as if I know her, as if I was over her place that morning, drinking coffee with fake vanilla creamer while kids run/scoot/flop around at our feet. "Would you believe GGC's husband was car jacked today in Hollywood?" I might say. Or, perhaps, "I really need to ask for the sangria recipe Mom-101 used at Thalia's birthday party." And then there's the alliterative "T got a tattoo today!" The Partner always nods along, speaks up in the right places, seems interested enough. He lost the right the comment on the strangeness of talking with such familiarity about people one only knows through the Internet the day he married the girl he met on AOL.

The problem arises when a blog stops, sometimes without notice. One day there is a regular post, and the next, nothing. Then more nothing, till it's weeks later and the comments on that last regular post are all "Where are you? Are you alright? I'm worried!"

I'm not going to go all dramatic and say it's like losing a best friend, but there's a sadness there, certainly. Somewhere along the line, we came to rely on the humor, the drama, the insights of a person we've never met. We took her stories to heart, and felt good keeping them there.

Readers know writers through words. But words aren't everything. Each blogger has her own real world beyond the computer, and as much as we can decipher about it from the screen, that knowledge can never be close to everything. So, maybe when one of our favorite blogs stops, we wonder. We worry. And we're not sure what to do, because it's not like we were ever really friends...

Were we?


***

Comments

  1. KristenAugust 16, 2006 at 12:23 PM

    We've been emailing and googling her with no avail...

    It sucks. I just hope everything is okay.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mom101August 16, 2006 at 6:47 PM

    I'm with K - we hope for the best. I suppose she owes us nothing, nor we, her. But it would still be nice just to know.

    You'd have to ask Nate for the sangria recipe by the way. I just know the Fairway bill was like $170 before the wine.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Mrs. ChickyAugust 16, 2006 at 7:46 PM

    Well, now my interest is piqued. But whomever this mystery blogger is I hope everything if okay. In some twisted way I agree with you that the bloggers I read become part of my circle of friends and I would hate for one of them to disappear without a word.

    ReplyDelete
  4. LaurenAugust 16, 2006 at 8:03 PM

    Of course you were/are! :) That's what is so great about blogging.

    ReplyDelete
  5. mamatulipAugust 17, 2006 at 10:31 AM

    I think I'm talking about the same blogger you're talking about when I say that it's just so sudden for her to stop. And strange.

    I hope everything's okay.

    ReplyDelete
  6. wordgirlAugust 17, 2006 at 2:22 PM

    I do this, too. Mr. Half gets an earful when we go out for our evening walks. Sometimes I even read the blogposts of other aloud to him. The mystery behind "abandoned" blogs is always interesting. Lately, I've had a couple of bloggers just say they were "hanging it up" for awhile. It makes me really sad.

    ReplyDelete
  7. JeniferAugust 20, 2006 at 7:30 AM

    Speaking of missing?????

    ReplyDelete
  8. toyfotoAugust 23, 2006 at 11:24 AM

    My husband really doesn't understand this about me, although he is trying to be supportive. I suppose even I think it's strange how strangers become friends without ever having met in person. But we are meeting, perhaps more meaningfully than we would at the market or the school yard.

    ReplyDelete
  9. JoOctober 1, 2006 at 11:03 AM

    I can relate and agree with your post. My hubby just shakes his head at me when I start talking about bloggers. To him everyone is just a stranger typing on a keyboard but when you follow someone's life even if only online they do become a part of yours.

    I love my blog friendships and cherish them because they have helped me learn and grow just like my in real life friendships have.

    To me, because of that we are friends and it is real.

    I hope the person who "disappeared" is alright too. I don't know who they are but that doesn't matter.

    ReplyDelete

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