Woo Tube (p. 3)

I started this blog about a year ago.

The intention, as I described in my first post, was to tell stories about France to people back home.

But most of these friends were not internet fiends. And they were swiftly outnumbered by strangers on my site.

Just one month into this electronic endeavor, some website listed me as one of its favorite blogs. This brought the Brits and a bunch of other unknowns to my door.

And they started leaving comments. It was weird.

"Who are these people?" I would shout across the room to where my husband was sitting with his own laptop. He would roll his eyes, rightly so, and then return to Googling himself.

Our courtship long ago had been conducted over the wires. Eight years and another continent later, we were still susceptible to those screen-based shivers.

Only not so much from eachother.

However odd the sensation, it didn't take long for me to adapt to writing for the invisible. It didn't matter that my readers had no faces and were prone to over-punctuation.

What mattered was that they loved me, insofar as that could be deduced from comments like " :-) " and "woo!!"

I found myself rushing to check the computer like I'd done back in the old days. They weren't romantic, these exchanges, but they held the same thrill of discovery.

Not all of these readers remained strangers. My first friends of blog origin were two Canadians who introduced themselves at a concert. They recognized me as "Le Meg," much to the amusement of my visiting friends. They later posted about the night as bloggers (I now know) are prone to do.

I began to spend more time online and outside the apartment. Things weren't going well at home, and this new universe (which had expanded into writing for Expatica and Parisist) was wonderfully distracting.

Eventually it became large enough to climb into.

It's odd to look back upon one year of blogging and think about everything that's happened. My marriage ended, I stayed in Paris and decided (after a brief pause) to stick with the blog.

To all of you who I've met in some way or other through this site...

(LadyK, Tin Foiled, Lauren, Eloïse, Sing Sing, Benjamin, Catherine, Clair, Bookpacker, Adrian, Mike, Rion, Garrincha, Anna, Bridget, Nabékor, David, Jussura, Bennett, Sophie, Nardac, Kirsty, Frog with a Blog, Suzanne, Kasia, Matthew, Kermit, Petite Americaine, Hugo, Kate, Phyllis, Daniel, Clotilde, Florian, Joanna, Elisabeth, Edvard, Katia, Kylie, Lisa, Always Ace, Negrito, Stuart, Chryde, Anna Boat, Amy, Braden and Laura, David, Dorie)

...and to all you unlinkables, invisibles and old dears - it's been lovely to have you around in this year of new beginnings.