More sugar

I'm back to finish up the "10 things you didn't know you didn't want to know about me" post.

1. I started my first blog in 2001 on Diaryland after I got my first real job out of grad school. I was working as a "publications specialist" for the EPA's air quality division. I spent six years training for what I thought would be a job in the magazine industry, but then I adopted a kid and realized I wasn't going to be the next media mogul. I entered the EPA job thinking I'd be developing my career, only going at a slower pace. Nope, it was boring and tedious and basically advanced proofreading. So to keep myself from dying of boredom, I blogged (in all lower case). Things were so different back then!

2. Through that blog, I met some really interesting women. Because blogging makes you feel closely connected to people, I wound up invited one of those women to come live with me. At the time, I was a single mom and she was a single mom. It made sense. I knew it was a mistake around week 2. I think it took her maybe a few days longer. I won't go into the whys and wherefors, but it was bad. I killed that blog to get away from the circus surrounding that experience and moved on to another one.

3. During the time that the Internet woman was living with me, the mountain man moved back to NC from his native Tennessee. He and I had been friends since I was 14, but I had no romantic interest in him. But she did ... and that sparked some weird competitiveness in me. So I took him. Turns out he's a really great partner and father, so I owe her a thank you for that.

4. The only thing about my mountain man is he didn't like being blogged about. In those early days I had not yet learned to offer a multi-dimensional view of my dearest ones and most often lambasted him. I saw my blog as a place to stew and vent, not a place to do PR for my relationship. However, he found my blog one day and was really hurt by my words. He requested that I shut it down. I resisted at first, but the fights and hurt feelings were more important than a blog, so I let it go.

5. I missed blogging. In real life, there's no one to listen to you whine and rant and laugh about the daily minutia of your life. And those who do listen don't want the steady stream of narcissism that blogs inherently are. So I started blogging about our wedding process and that morphed into the blog you're reading now. I have another blog/website project brewing, but it won't replace this spot as the place where I come to reconnect with myself and others.

Whew. That was harder than I thought it'd be. Thanks again to Amber for giving me the Sugar Doll award.