I’ve read a few posts lately, where people are asking their lurkers to unmask, comment, and I’m kind of puzzled as to why?  Why do you need to know who’s looking at you?  Are you worried about stalkers?  Well, if so, then I guess I’d have to tell you that you probably should have thought about that issue before you started blogging.  You know, before you threw your life out there on the intarwebz, for all the world to see.  It’s really the equivalent of allowing random strangers to come into your house and root through your undie drawer, in a mental way.  You know that, right?  Um, yeah, it is.  That is, if you’re doing more than Christmas Letter blogging.  And, when I started blogging, I knew that, and I knew that this was my journal, but with a strange twist, other people would be reading it.  Other people would hear the voices in my head.  Other people would read about my victories and my defeats, my good and my bad, and my in-between.  Oh, there’s a certain line even I won’t cross, especially when it comes to the other people in my life who have varying degrees of comfort with their lives being shared, but for the most part what you see here is what you get.  I’ve been told by people I meet who only know me from blogging that it’s like they’ve known me for years.  Because they’ve been reading my life for a while and they know everything that’s going on.  Even the bad things, although I do use some judicious editing in those areas, to protect the guilty mainly.  But most of the time it’s no filters allowed.  Good, bad, and ugly.  And I’m okay with that.   That’s why the anonymous traffic to this thing really doesn’t bother me.  Mostly those are people who fall in here, as they were looking for something else, and then leave as quietly as they came in.  Welcome to all of you – sorry this wasn’t a Wizard of Oz site!  And, of course, I have my regular readers, both anonymous and well-known.  And really, I’m not so interested in knowing who the anonymous regulars are.  They’re remaining that way for a reason.  They want to be left alone, to read and ponder, or to laugh and call me an idiot, and I’m fine with that.  I guess that might be a statement on my lack of introspection, but really, they’re just doing what I do to about fifty or more blogs a day.  Reading peoples’ thoughts, laughing or grimacing, and moving on.  So, when I read a post asking for lurkers to unmask and comment, I shake my head and smile.  I won’t ever do that, you can be sure.  But I will say Hello!  To whomever it is that loves me over in Brevard, NC… welcome!  You come back so regularly, you and a friend from there too.  Glad you like me, or hate me, but you still read me.  And all the traffic from the Phillipines – hey to you guys too!  Not in the market for a mail-order bride, but I’ll let my single guy friends know about you.  Oh, and to all the peeps here in the Knox-vegas area who stop by and look around – think of this as an online open house!  Just don’t walk on the white carpet in the guest bath, I hate cleaning that stuff!  I guess my point is that I feel as long as somebody other than the Bob’s ex or my Mom is reading this then I’m a successful blogger.  I don’t need Alltop or anything like that to give me validation.  And I don’t need to know who exactly it is that’s going through my underwear drawer.  They’re reading, you’re reading, and that’s what matters the most.  Not comments.  Whoever you are, you keep coming back, so there’s something here that you like.  Come back as much as you want.  Comment if you feel like it.  But understand that there’s no pressure.  I like being invisible sometimes too.  It’s okay.  Welcome.

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