I thought writing a blog would be free of angst and hidden pitfalls. Just write, post ‘n’ go. Easy. I have been writing stuff, playing with my creative side which, now I have time on my hands, has resurfaced, and, a few months ago, after being encouraged to send bits here and there to my mum to read I thought maybe it was the time to put it all in blog form. This, I decided, would make me more disciplined in my writing and most importantly it looked far prettier! After a few clicks melliemadrid was born, a vessel for the somewhat random ramblings I write when the mood takes me. This means I need to try my best to ensure the spelling and grammar are both fault free, I have to strive to ensure my sentence structure is well structured, and I have to try to make it entertaining, because it’s going to be read by people!  People I know. People I don’t know. Eek!!

Don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that people other than my mum are reading my blog posts. I get a real buzz everytime I see my blog has been visited (I have become a stats page obsessive!) and I love seeing which country my readers come from. As well as readers from the UK and Spain and Oz and NZ (thank you family and friends!) I’ve had readers from the USA, Jersey and Japan; the Netherlands, Greece and Thailand; Italy and India. And more! Thank you for reading. You make this fledgling writer very happy! 

I’m really enjoying that people are enjoying it. At least I hope they are enjoying it….I have had some really encouraging comments. But it did take quite a lot of courage to put myself out there. I couldn’t quite believe that I was a good enough writer. I’m sure some may think I’m crap, and that’s fine, they don’t need to read it, I’m not holding a gun to anyone’s head. I don’t ask people if they have read my latest post and I’m always slightly embarrassed if anyone mentions it to my face! Some of my closest friends  haven’t read anything I’ve written because they are not on social media where I promote my blog and I’m too reticent to tell them.

So why did I make it public? Call it showing off or whatever but I believe that we all have the need to be noticed and appreciated. Don’t we all want a pat on the back or a gold star from time to time? And anyone who is creative usually wants an audience. Singer/songwriters upload videos onto You Tube. Artists exhibit their work. Talented chefs craft up amazing dishes wanting them to be appreciated by discerning diners. Social media bombards us daily with showing off posts so it’s not such a big deal anyway. 

But I think that putting anything out into the wider world carries with it a responsibility. I have to have the fact that anyone can read what I publish, not in the back of my mind but firmly in the forefront. And sometimes this can cause me to put the brakes on my outpourings. I’m not a very controversial, political or opinionated person so I’m unlikely to offend. But I am essentially producing ‘confessional’ writing and while I’m happy writing nonsense about my life, what about when I want to include my family and friends or other people who briefly come into my life? How can I sensitively do this? I’m not usually a nasty person but if I find myself being nasty and if it makes a good story I will probably write about it. I will only be hanging myself out to dry! However I may well find myself wanting to write about nasty things that nasty people have done to me and I will have to choose my words carefully so as not to reveal identities too easily. Although if they are that nasty should I really care?! Usually I will want to write nice things about nice people but even so they may not want their names and things they have done (or not done) splashed all over the pages of my little blog. My last post was about the end of a friendship. I wanted to write sensitively about something that deserved sensitivity. But I wanted to write honestly about something that deserved honesty. I tried to use discretion and I didn’t use names. It wouldn’t have been appropriate or fair. It wasn’t easy to write about it. It took a month to decide to write about it. But I needed to write about it. This blog is my therapy sometimes. 

Maybe one day you will recognise yourself in a post! Hopefully it will be a story about something nice. Hopefully I will have been sensitive and hopefully you won’t mind.