Want 'Em, Need 'Em, Got 'Em**

Blogroll Me!

Am I a needy person? Sometimes.

Sometimes I need attention; sometimes I need privacy; sometimes I need reassurance and a sense of security; sometimes I need to retreat while other times I need to soar.

And over time I've decided that I need a blog. I need my blog. I need others' blogs.

Yes, I had a life BB (Before Blogging) -- and I certainly have a life with blogging.

A fellow blogger once implied something, which my brain just won't shake off. He implied that the blogging world is just that: a world of bloggers. We are strangers, who primarily continue to be strangers.

But I beg to differ. My already-rich world has certainly expanded. Because over the years I've had dwindling patience to read novels (I read 8 hours/day for my job; it saturated me), reading blogs has become, in a sense, my open door to learning about the world. I've learned many life lessons by reading the words of people who put their hearts on the line. I've learned about music, politics, current events, medicine, literature. I've learned about psychology, sociology, religion and the culinary arts.

Reading a blog is not always the equivalent to reading a newspaper or a magazine. I may get insight to a situation, but it is a first-hand account, a personal retelling that creates color for its readers, creates the need oftentimes to comment.

I think I can count a number of bloggers as friends, and not merely acquaintances. Perhaps it's because I choose to often correspond offline, and so we step outside the perimeters of our posts. We have a first name, and a last name. Our personal histories, our impressions are shared.

And it is about sharing. "Listening" when someone else "speaks." Offering up advice, a personal POV, an editorial or literary critique, etc.

Over the past several months, in my blogging world, I've watched babies being born, family members being sick, beloved friends and family members dying. I've watched people prepare for aliyah, people preparing for marriage, people finding their way in this world. Mazel Tovs, messages of condolence, Yasher Koachs have been exchanged. I've watched blessings pass through cyberspace time and time again -- blessings for good health, blessings of compassion, blessings for happiness.

All in my little community of bloggers.

My path has crossed with people whose paths would probably not have crossed mine in the real world: a fifty-year-old funny gal, a Hollywood screenwriter, a mystery author, a former actress-turned-businesswoman, children's authors, a funny teacher in NJ, fathers in the Midwest and near the Capitol, doctors on the West Coast, a Swiss miss, gifted writers who are half my age or more, parents who've had to live through terrible personal challenges and wear a cloak of grief.

I want these people in my world, I need these people in my world, I've got these people in my world.

And I am truly blessed...

___

** The title of this post hails back to my childhood when friends collected sports cards and other collectibles. The person would sort through the collection for friends, in order to do some trading, and a refrain of "Got it! Need it! Want it!" could be heard.