I’ve been blogging for about four years now. There has been some ebb and flow in both the amount I post and the amount of other blogs I read over that time. Lately though its all become less fun and somehow harder to do. In my other blog I actually missed posting on several business days in a row for the first time in months. Usually I have so many posts in my head that I post several days worth at a time and am a week or more ahead. Not lately.
I don’t post as often here as I would like but there was a time when I posted daily at another blog that has been effectively abandoned. I had thought to move more of that blogging here but instead I just cut back. So total posting is really down about half or more from my peek. I still think about blog posts. I even write them in my head. What’s different is that I don’t actually get them written and posted. Why? Complicated.
Of course some of it is time. I have been traveling a lot lately. A week in Texas and couple of days in New York with lots of local New England day trips in the mix. And there is all this stuff to do because of the Christmas holidays. But that’s not all.
I used to take the computer into the family room and read and write blogs while watching TV. Lately I find I just want to get away from the computer. A bit of information overload I think. I just want to rest my brain.
Recently my brother and I talked about visiting a family owned home that is not much used in the winter. My brother said "but the cable TV and Internet connections are shut down for the season. Why would you go?" I answered "because the cable TV and Internet connections are shut down." Time with my thoughts. Time to pray. Time to just disconnect from the hustle and bustle of a world trying to live on Internet time.
I realized today that I have been programming computers for longer than more than half of Microsoft’s employees have even been alive. It’s been 35 years since my first computer program was written (in FORTRAN) and I have been running as fast as I can to keep up with the technology ever since. I’m not as young as I used to be. I think now and again I need to get off the treadmill and take a breather.
I’m planning on taking some time off from work for the week that joins Christmas and New Years. My wife is threatening to confiscate my Treo so I can’t check email while away from the computer. I think she’s planning on getting me out of the house and well away from the computers as well. I think it will be good for me.
The only question is will I come back revived and roaring to go again or will I perhaps find that I like being "off the net" better than on it? And if the latter then what do I do?
I’ve been getting, “Why aren’t you on AIM?” questions a lot lately. And I don’t really know how to answer them. I really don’t miss it that much, though.
I’m probably getting even more compulsive about checking my e-mail; I use my Treo as my alarm, so it’s right there by my bed. So I can check my e-mail before I even get out of bed. Sometimes it’s handy (the other day I wondered if I had to get up to to go to a meeting, and, since no one ever replied to my e-mail, I just went back to sleep). But usually it’s not.
I find that it’s all an old habit that’s hard to break. I’ll sign onto AIM every now and then and not even remember doing it. I’ll find that I have GMail open in three tabs of my browser, and I’ll start to write a blog post before I know what I want to say. So for me, I don’t think it’s an easy habit to break. Taking time off, though, may help you break the habit… I have to admit I envy you slightly for it.