Blogging is like talking underwater

Remember that philosophical question that goes something like this; "If a tree falls in the forest and there is nobody there to hear it, does it make a sound?" Well, I'm starting to wonder if blogging isn't a little like that.

Honestly, I keep seeing an image of me trying to talk underwater when I was a boy. I made some noise, and had to be a little careful about how long I talked, but knew full well that my words ended up sounding like bubbly nonsense.

I see that image whenever I think about this blogging thing. Now maybe for someone living on-line with limitless energy and optimism, someone who has hundreds of online social media contacts this blogging is a perfect fit. For an old fart like me with a sum total of seventeen Facebook followers as an online presence...well, maybe not so much of a fit. First, you have the time siphon of learning how to set up a blog that actually works the way your vision wants it to. Then, when you are down to your last dozen hairs on your head, you have to figure out why the hell your well-crafted words are getting all the attention of a television-evangelist on Super-Bowl Sunday.

I have paid for just about every e-book about blogging and making money with a blog I could find. My conclusion? The people making money blogging are the people writing books about how to make money blogging. The beauty of that line of work is that those writers don't have to know what they are talking about. They string a bunch of words together that sound like a discussion about blogging, often repeating the words in other chapters with a few substituted adverbs, then upload to book and put a price tag on it. The reader ends up with a virtual book full of virtual knowledge and a very real migraine headache from the eye-strain that comes from looking for worthwhile information that will help him create a successful blog.

I do have to wonder whether the term "successful blog" isn't an oxymoron with an emphasis on moron. Still, I have to consider that the term may fit in my case since some wonderful troll felt it necessary to his daily happiness to stop by my author Facebook page and leave me this one-word message of support, "Moron".