Cleaning up. It had to be done:(

I've had this blog since 2005. Way back, back when blogging was one of the rare forms of social media. No YouTube, no Twitter, no Facebook, no Yelp - just Blogger, Friendster (I think) ... and AOL chat dying off.

I met a few people by perusing blogs and discovering a mutual appreciation for each other's writing. But blogging was mainly for me to keep in touch with people I had become friends with who either lived far away or ended up moving far enough to make it a challenge to keep in touch. Blogging was such an easy way to remedy the situation. I got to keep in touch with my dear sister, old roommates, neighbors, classmates and friends. Blogging, I believe, also helped me keep up my writing skills.

Things change, though: easier and faster ways to connect with people were created; as my jobs grew greater in responsibility and pay, the demand of my time and energy also grew exponentially; I have my own home to take care of; and the greatest whopper of them all - I became a mama. All these things make blogging less and less of a priority.

Yet I lamented over and over again how I miss it. Although it takes more time and effort, the substance of communication my friends and I had through blogs was so much richer and more personal. Like dieting, though, I would try to start blogging again only to stop again because it was so much easier to go to back to things like Facebook.

But I've taken a big step just today to show just how serious I am about wanting to use this forum again. It was hard and something I had postponed for months, no, years. I deleted all the blogs that my friends have left behind. It was something I honestly dreaded. I think it's because I wanted to believe that, like me, they would resurrect their little place on the internet and start writing again.

You see, I have some talented and fascinating family & friends. Their writing styles were all different but very entertaining. Their viewpoints on the world were sometimes similar to mine, sometimes way out of left field (in my opinion, of course) but always worth reading. And I wanted to believe that they, too, would find time to write again. My own sister hasn't written on her blog for two and a half years yet I kept hoping she would return!

I had been holding out in deleting their blogs because, just like with my own, their old entries were like reminiscing with old friends. Many of them wrote about just starting out in their careers; dating and life before they met their significant others; falling in love; moving out of state, across the country or even international waters; pregnancy and becoming a new mom; small yet significant (and sometimes crazy) every day occurrences that seem ordinary but made for good stories; and all those other wonderful and lovely things that happen to us as we get older. And, sometimes, experiences not so lovely. Their blogs documented their lives and it's hard for me to let go of them even though they have been long since abandoned.

When I decided to do the Great Blog Clean Up, I was surprised to see it had been so long since a few of my friends had written that blog addresses had been taken over by different people. The way I have people listed on my blog, I can see the last time they wrote an entry. So I knew that some folks hadn't touched their blogs in months or even years. But I had kind of held hope. Well, when I clicked on links just to verify if they truly hadn't written this whole time (sometimes that new entry indicator is inaccurate), I had at least two friends who no longer owned their blog addresses. All of these inactive blogs I still listed on my blog made me realize that it was time to let go.

I doubt that I will make new friends through blogs like I had done before just because, as I mentioned, it's a different time now. I notice that people are more strategic about who they visit instead of using the "next blog" button to visit others because they want to be build readership for their own blog. I totally get it. I know there are many worthwhile blogs but I just don't have time to do that. I'm also not trying to use my blog to gain advertising - again, completely understand and actually envy women who get paid to write their blogs but I just don't have that kind of time.

I used to write for me and my friends because I loved reading their comments and us having a full on conversation about it. But now I just write for me and maybe my family if they decide to visit my blog years down the road. I foolishly still hold out hope, though. That some if not all of my blogger friends will one day come back and drop me a comment with their new blog address so I get to read them again. Maybe it's simply the hormones making me more sentimental but I truly miss you guys.