Occasionally I’ll get obsessive about my comments and start to worry that my blog has turned into little more than a public conversation with Karen. Or even worse, that I’m pontificating to an empty room or indifferent passers-by, like a crazy street prophet on the side of the road. The idea makes me extremely self-conscious, despite the fact that I still officially maintain that this blog is primarily for my own benefit.
Every once in a while, though, I discover a blog lurker (Hi, Katie!), or I get a comment from a semi-lurker like my mom and Abbey. I have decided that these people are my favorite readers. I have no idea when they do or don’t come around, but I can always comfort myself with their presence. On a really insecure day, I can imagine an army of readers, peeking at the blog from the shadows, laughing hysterically at my jokes or stroking their chins thoughtfully at a serious point. Even as I write this, I’m reminding myself of the poor protagonist of A Beautiful Mind, but, it’s reassuring anyway.
I have a fondness for lurkers not just because they shore up my own self-confidence, but because I am one myself as well. I comment faithfully on about two blogs. I read about ten, some of which are written by people I have never met. That’s the beauty of this whole thing.
This post is not an appeal for lurkers to show themselves by leaving comments; I’m happy to preserve the mystery. But, to those of you who are out there (you know who you are), I’m glad you’re reading.
running in circles 
Not that I want all of you regular commenters to turn into lurkers. I love you, too!
Yes… thanks for that addendum… I was beginning to feel unloved.
Is your lurker the Katie I know?
Oh… AND (the conversation with Karen continues) there are trackers you can set up on your site to see where people are from that are viewing your site. Some you can figure out where they are, but others are in random places like Canada or England. It will also tell you how long that person stayed there, what links they clicked on, etc.
I DON’T recommend you set this up. I got very obsessive about mine, so I finally took it off. (Actually, I think beta took it off for me.)
Beta took my tracker off, too, but I put it back on! Thankfully, I forget I have it except every few months, when I’ll spend an hour looking to see how people found my site. It’s pretty interesting. My post about Leanna’s hair color possibilities got a lot of hits from people who Googled “Fall Hair Color.” Who knew?
It is partly because people us RSS readers a lot now. So I just read your posts and then go to the next blog to read.
I’m a faithful reader but erstwhile commenter. Keep writing!
@ Karend and Lydia- no trackers for me! I have enough things to obsess about. Although it does sound interesting.
@ Cliff- thanks for yet another excuse for a low-comment day
@ Carolyn- I’ll call you a semi-lurker now. 🙂
hi linds.
I will have you know that I have read EVERY blog of yours. I slacked off while I was on maternity leave because it was hard to find time to get to the computer, but I went back and read the October-December of 06 blogs later when I had time. (Now that’s loyalty, right?)I check on your blog randomly to see if you have written anything new. I am always very dissapointed when I have to wait several days for a new post. Your blog are hilarious about 80% of the time and just intriguing the other 20%. Still, kudos to you…keep it up.
Love,
Abs