I’ve been thinking about the knitblogging community since I started exploring the blogs seriously last winter. Recently I have realized something, though. It may not be true, and please correct me if I am totally wrong, but here’s the thing. Linking from one blog to another to another is a bit like falling down the rabbit hole – when will it end? And so I have imagined that the knitblogging community is like the whole Internet: vast, and for all practical purposes, infinite. I realize now that that image had rather intimidated me. With all that knitting skill and knowledge and writing talent already out there, the idea of starting my own blog seemed… presumptuous. Sort of like watching a bunch of tennis matches on TV and then challenging Andre Agassi to a match. Really, what could I possibly add to the conversation? What did I have to say that hadn’t already been said, probably multiple times and certainly better, already?
Then, maybe it was going to see La Harlot in Eau Claire a few weeks ago, or maybe it was before that, the time that I commented on her blog and she actually replied. (I was star struck, really. The Queen of the Knitting Blogs replied to MY comment! Wow!) Or maybe it really started when Cara said, at roughly the same time, that people should comment on the blogs they read, not just lurk. Bloggers live for the comments. I took that to heart and have since made more of an effort to comment whenever something in a blog touched me or made me think or reminded me of something that seemed worth sharing. (Believe me, when you get as old as I am, EVERYTHING reminds you of something else. That’s why old people can blather on so much. Be charitable: you’ll be old yourself someday. If you are lucky.)
Anyway.
I now picture the knitblogging community as a small town rather than like the entire Internet. To me it resembles a village of, say, about 2,500 people, coincidentally the size of the hamlet where my parents and I lived when I was in high school. It’s big enough that you can get some diversity of views, but small enough that you can recognize pretty much everyone and know the more significant players fairly well if you choose to. More importantly, they can know you, if you choose (for better or for worse) to put yourself out there on view.
This whole idea made knitblogging even more appealing to me. Suddenly I wasn’t so intimidated any more. I can write a coherent sentence. I have decent grammar and can spell koreklee correctly. Occasionally I even write darned well, if I do say so myself. My camera is a cheapie but it does okay; studying other blogs has taught me a few things about taking a blog-worthy photo. Mostly, though, I just wanted to write and chat about knitting and stuff with other knitters and stuff-lovers.
If you read the blogs you keep coming upon some of the same names over and over – Wendy, Grumperina, Ann, Kay, Cara, Stephanie, Franklin, Lee Ann, Norma, Bookish Wendy, mamacate, Teyani, Girl from Auntie. I could go on and so could you, I bet. At La Harlot’s appearance in Eau Claire, at one point I heard someone refer to Knittybaby and heard myself murmur, “Oh, Knittybaby!” and then wonder if Little Man had come along. Even though I had only read her blog occasionally – so many blogs, so little time – I had that instant of recognition. Wow.
For more information on the knitblogging community, see what Data Mining has to say about it.
So, what do you think? How big is this knitblogging bunch, anyway? More to the point, how big does it feel to you?
