Time of the Month

End of the Line

Well, hello there. It's been a while.

I did say I would return to the blog in February once my Bootcamp finished... I'm sure you've all been waiting with bated breath.
Now that I'm officially done and graduated, I'm struggling to come back to this blog.

I think there's a few reasons. One, I don't like talking about myself. I struggle to write bios and personal statements, for the same reason. I just don't enjoy it and don't have much to say. What else is a blog, if not exclusively writing about yourself?

Two, I'm a private person by nature, so blogging about personal things on a public site that anyone could read, even with a great community like this one, still kind of makes me uncomfortable. Especially after so long. I'm a different person than I was 6 months ago, in a lot of ways. Too much has happened to "catch up" half a year in a blog entry. I don't even know where I’d start.

Three, this is going to sound odd and possibly elitist, but I've recently realized that my daily life is not very interesting or relatable to the average person. I live in a weird academic bubble, in a job that most people know very little about and can't relate to. Not just a "job", academia is your life and your identity. Trying to explain the world I'm currently in to folks who aren't in it kind of makes me feel like an alien.

And so, this blog really became a chore to update every month. That's probably why it was the first thing to go when I got overwhelmed. Looking back, I think it showed. No one wants to read something that the author didn't really want to write.

I'd rather spend my time and writing energy on something creative and fun.

That is to say, I don't think I'm going to bring this monthly blog back after all. At least, not in the same format. I'd only start blogging again if I could make it creative or topical, instead of just about my life. For important or interesting life updates, I prefer posting shorter newsfeed updates in real time than curated monthly blogs.

So if you do care about what's happening in my life, you'll still be able to follow along in my notebook when something of note happens.

I'll have to think a little more about what I could turn this blog into that would be more interesting, to me and those reading.
Until then, I guess this is the end of another blog era. Hope I haven't disappointed anyone.