More Than Just a Blog

I’ve thought about starting a blog for quite a while now. It took me months though to finally do it. I wanted to take the time to figure out what I wanted to do with it and what my purpose should be. What’s the point of a blog anyway? Is it a public diary? A way to become famous? Make money? None of this really sounded right to me, but that seems to be the way most people use blogs – for self-promotion. That’s not a world I really wanted to be drawn into.

But then something happened. I made a friend. A friend who has a blog, though she hesitates to call herself a blogger. I watched how she used it, as a way to share her life and bless other people. And I, as a reader, used it as a way to keep up with her. I came across a few other blogs that were similar – normal people with normal lives, sharing the beauty that can be found in normality. I found a conservative Christian blogger, writing about current events in a way I’d never seen before. I started reading my cousin’s blog, which I had shamefully neglected, and saw how she shares so much of her life with the people who truly care. And finally it clicked. Yes, a blog can become about self-promotion and notoriety. But it can also just be about friendship and life, sharing and talking about the things that really matter to us, seeking to bless others, while being blessed ourselves.

This is what I hope to do. This isn’t a public diary, or a way to seek fame and money. I may be unable to resist the urge to occasionally climb on top of my soapbox for certain subjects, but I’ll try to control myself, because this isn’t a platform for diatribes. What this really is, is a letter. Most of you are my friends, and this is a way to share with you. Maybe I’ll even make a few new friends along the way. I don’t really know where Close to Heart & Home is going to take me, but I hope I can make it mean as much as other blogs have meant to me.