Confessions of a lurker

It’s time to come clean. I’ve been reading other people's blogs for quite some time now but have only recently had the good manners/plucked up the courage to comment on a few of them. As ali was one of the first bloggers I stumbled upon and, as she has raised the lurking question generally, I thought I’d share my story.

I'm a bit of a technophobe really, not what you'd call an early adopter, so to be honest I only found out about blogging by accident. I was going through a "useless" patch. House was a tip (still is come to that), work was getting me down (ditto) and I was searching around the internet for ways to get organised.

What I found was the FlyLady. Now, although she has some good ideas, I just couldn't get on with some of her more "Praise the Lord" and "Stepford Wife" suggestions. All a bit too American (not that I have anything against Americans or people who praise the lord - it's just not me).

So I decided to see if there was a UK equivalent, and in the process stumbled across blogging. I think Becoming Domestic was the first one I found and from there I linked to Frugal Trenches and Ted and Agnes. And that was it - I was hooked. There were these women downshifting, growing vegetables, making beautiful things, living the idyllic life I dreamed of. A quick Google search then brought me to Domesticali who even had my dream job in a cake selling bookshop. From there I linked to The Magpie Files which then became ...the sight of morning.... Then it was on to The Coffee Lady and Silverpebble. And the list goes on, though most of the above are still my most regular places to lurk.

So why did it take me so long to comment? Fear, I guess. I wasn't sure if I was even allowed to comment if I didn't have a blog of my own. And, because most of the blogs I visit are linked to each other, I felt it might be a bit of an exclusive club where my clamouring for attention may not be welcome. You know, trying to hang out with the popular girls...

How wrong I was. Something about this post finally persuaded me to put my head above the parapet. It was a scary feeling, pressing the submit button, but then I got a lovely email back from ali and that was all the encouragement I needed. I still don't comment as often as I should but I'm getting better.

And now I've started blogging (does just 2 posts count?) I guess I've got no excuses anymore. Already I can see that it must be nice to get a comment. All I have to do now is write something worth commenting on!