Kyle Hepp

May 20, 2007

Lately I’ve become totally addicted to reading other people’s blogs. It all started when I was looking for weight loss information and I stumbled across Half of Me. Her style of writing is hilarious and her story is really inspiring. I am fascinated by weight loss stories, maybe because I myself have fought that battle most of my life, although not to the same extreme (Half of Me is about a girl who has lost literally half her previous body weight). Anyways, after I started reading Half of Me, I followed her links and began reading other people’s weight loss blogs as well. Now I’m addicted! Every day I check up on the dozen or so blogs that I have favorited. I wait anxiously to see if they’ve had a weigh in, how they’re doing, how they’re feeling. And when I began to do this I remembered something important.

Writing is cathartic.

I used to have a LiveJournal, in which I actually wrote pretty religiously. Then one day some soccer moms from the small town in Michigan I’m from discovered the link. Pretty soon I felt like half the town was reading about and therefore they felt free to stick their nose in my personal business. This little town is extremely religious (no offense if you’re a church goer) and has a tendency to take things to the extreme. They found it particularly scandalous that I’m a liberal who’s friend with *gasp* gay people, believes in rights for migrant workers, even if they are *gasp again* illegal, that I’m pro-choice, and drink alcohol, etc.

One day, I wrote a short post. I believe it said something along the lines of how I was happy to have left Michigan because the city in Florida that I moved to was more liberal and had really helped open my mind. It gave me a different perspective on the world. I said I enjoyed meeting new and different types of people, especially because my university was so diverse that it gave me a chance to expand my horizons, and I had not previously had this opportunity in said small town. I closed the journal entry stating I was happy to get out of “the bubble” that was my previous life.

When word got out that I had dared to challenge the ways of life of my old town I started receiving comment after comment on my LJ. I was told that I should “move to Mexico and go hump the damn latinos if you love them so much.” I was called a “rich bitch,” and told that I shouldn’t offend people who were “forced” to stay in the small town because they didn’t have rich parents who could pay for them to go out of state (I paid for college by myself with scholarship and student loans, FYI). I was told that I was a “fat, stupid loser,” among other things. Someone even went so far as to create a website called thebubble.com (the site was taken down like two years ago so don’t bother to check it out). The website said more horrible things about me and had pictures of my face posted on obese women’s bodies. (I was overweight in high school so I guess that was their ammo).

I wasn’t too upset, just a little surprised because some of the people who were among the first to cut me down used to be friends of mine. But, I kind of felt like a celebrity. After The Bubble Incident, as I call it, the readership of my LJ probably quadrupled overnight. People were watching my every move. My mom had mothers of kids from my high school that she didn’t even know come up to her and comment on my life. I kept up the LJ a little longer but it really was too much scrutiny so I just stopped writing altogether.

Now that I have started reading so many people’s blogs, I see how much it helps them. Whether their blogs keep them on track with their diet, sort out their angry feelings towards a spouse, let them vent about work, or just plain record their daily adventures, writing is therapy. And I need that. And I have way too much time on my hands.

Needless to say, I’m going to try and keep this blog a little more private than my Livejournal was.