Secondary purposes
In my mission statement I’m claiming that I’ve set out to improve my writing skills. That might be true, but that is to ignore my other, perhaps less goal-oriented reasons for writing a blog.
I’m not letting anybody I know read this “blog”, so it’s pretty much a diary, albeit somewhat public, since I do intend to publish these posts online pseudynomously. I believe I’m choosing this form of publication, so that I don’t have to show my less-than-perfect English to those I know, and so that nobody will be able to criticize me. I don’t actually mind negative feedback, but in this case it seems like I don’t want to feel exposed. If better writing skills was my only goal, I’d certainly tell people about the blog, so that I could expect at least some feedback.
Ever since I was a child, I imagined that if a God existed–almighty and all-knowing–they’d know exactly how many steps I’ve taken in my life. And exactly where I’ve placed my foot, so they’d be able to color the ground yellow in my tracks, perhaps coloring the areas that I’ve stepped on multiple times in a shade of orange or red. This is of course very different from writing a blog, but if I continue to write consistently for a few years I’ll certainly have the data necessary to statistically analyze my writing. Together with my already ongoing project of cataloguing my physical exercise (including walking), I can at least begin to have this admittedly creepy detailed knowledge of what I’m doing with my life. I suppose I’m not alone in wanting to catalogue my life: I seem to recall others referring to this as a life log.