Anonymity?

Last night I went to Happy Hour with a close friend of mine from college, during which I casually mentioned that I started writing a blog.  I have not told many people in my personal life that I write a blog.  I mean, what if I want to blog about them?  Heaven forbid they read it!---eek!!

This particular friend, let's call her Lisa, has a fantastic blog that she's been writing for about five years now.  Lisa is not only very smart and quick-witted, but also an excellent writer, and her blog, from what I can tell, is a very successful. Her one proviso regarding her blog is that she writes it 100% anonymously.  No names are ever mentioned.  No pictures are ever posted.  She has a pseudonym, and everyone she references has one as well, a la "Mr. Big" in Sex and the City.  Now, in her writing, she tends to discuss very personal topics.  Though it varies, she writes a lot about relationships--with men, family, friends--and personal triumphs and tragedies.  Things that, as a writer, one might long to share but, as a vulnerable human, one might prefer to keep confidential. She also has a very public and somewhat conservative job, so for her it makes sense to not have a public blog. 

When I told her I'd been blogging, she was excited, but her first words were, "Change the title of your blog."  At first I thought she was advising me that it wasn't catching or appealing enough, which--let's face it--it's not.  But I quickly realized she was advising me to keep my blog completely anonymous, and that revealing my name was risky and a foolish and dangerous idea.  Lisa told me that her blog used to be under a different name (still not her real one), and one co-worker knew about it.  She wrote a post one day about another co-worker's voting strategy during an election, and the one co-worker "outed" Lisa's blog to the other.  Lisa said she had to beg and plead to keep her job.  Scary scary stuff. 

Although I can absolutely understand her point of view, especially considering how traumatic that particular experience must have been, I still countered a bit.  I told her, truthfully, I had tried originally to create a blog that was completely anonymous, but it had really been difficult.  And not enjoyable.  I was not/am not skilled enough to compose a story that has meaning to me without being able to reference some constant touchstones in my daily life.  It also defeated the purposes and goals of actually writing a blog.

I started writing this blog for two main reasons: 

First, I like to talk about health, diet, fitness and running.  A lot.  I have very few friends in "real-life" that run or enjoy discussing these topics, in all their minutia, the way I do.  A lot of my friends don't work out much at all.  It can be frustrating and lonely sometimes, when I put in a lot of time training and working out for a race, and a lot of my friends don't realize how big a time/energy commitment it is.  I wanted this blog as a forum to discuss those topics ad nauseaum.  Why bore my friends and loved ones with my exercise neurosis or my mile-by-mile race recaps when I can write it all down online?

Second, I wanted to share my thoughts with a community of people who have similar interests and/or have experienced the same things.  From one point of view, I suppose I could keep a food journal, or an exercise diary, or actually sign-on to the Daily Mile once in a while and update my workouts.  But, I wanted to delve a little deeper and share my experiences with others.   I like hearing about fellow runners and dieters.  I enjoy reading people's race reports as much, if not more, than I enjoy writing them. I like hearing about other people's struggles (both successes and failures) with their weight, or their diet or their PR for a race, or nursing an injury, etc.  It makes me feel like I'm not the only person with those issues.  lots of you have wacky knee problems, ITBS, tendinitis, etc. 

Also, I like having a written record to hold myself accountable for my running, diet and fitness activity. 

My girlfriend almost fell off her chair when I told her I not only use my real name, but I also have pictures of myself.  She gave me many strong words of caution: Safety.  Privacy.  Defamation of character.  Potential employers might google me and find my blog and see me as a liability, or my current employer might not like what I am writing and/or assume I'm writing on company time.  She's not wrong, of course.  Those are fair points and I should take them into consideration.  But, I've googled myself and rarely does my blog come up.  Also, I don't think the content is controversial....or at least, not controversial enough to warrant anonymity.  Am I being irresponsible?

My current place of employment strongly promotes and encourages the use of facebook to further the mission of our organization.  (Obviously, they don't promote using it for personal reasons on company time, but staff is encourages to have a facebook page.)  We have several blogs accessible online related to our work.  The people who write those blogs professionally, and handle our official facebook page(s), all have their own personal blogs.  Several of them share their blogs through facebook, so even though I might not know certain colleagues very well through work, I've gotten to know them on a personal level by reading their blog.  Heck, even our Executive Vice President has his own personal blog.  He talks about baseball, bluegrass music, architecture and travel. I enjoy getting to know this other side of him, outside of the office. Lisa scoffed a bit that these people were being equally as reckless. 

Admittedly, I'm a newcomer to the blog-o-sphere, so I am maybe not yet as familiar with all of the ins and outs of blog quality control.  But I considered, almost all of the blogs I follow with maybe one or two exceptions, are similar to mine in that the authors publicly share their personal experiences.  I see pictures of my fellow bloggers completing races, or contemplating what they (you, really) might wear on race day.  I enjoy that familiarity, it's what makes the "blogging community" an actual community rather than silos of separate faceless entities.   At least, that's my opinion.  Even my girlfriend's blog is more interesting because I know her.  I read about anonymous characters, but I can put real life names and faces with her stories. 

I don't know exactly how I feel about this yet.  It's hard to be objective, but I'm not sure I would be an avid reader of an anonymous blog without feeling some sort of personal connection to the author.  As a writer, I believe that, if I were grappling with some deeper, darker subjects, I might prefer to keep my blog anonymous.  But, I'm not sure my friend, having never actually seen my blog, understood the levity and light-hearted tone of SkinnyMaryMichael.  I don't discuss anything tremendously deep or controversial.  I think the heaviest debate would be a vegan diet versus the Atkins diet, or the Galloway training program versus the Hal Higdon one.....not exactly soul-searching debate. (Well, maybe for some. ;))

At the same time, I haven't shared the fact that I even write a blog with many people.  I suppose, mostly, it just hasn't come up that often in conversation.  I've told my mom, who has no idea how to find my blog...I'm not sure she 100% understands what a "blog" is.  I told my friend Cassie, who also has a very cute [not-anonymous] blog, and I told one very close friend who thinks everything I write is fabulous....or, well....at least he won't tell me if he thinks it's rotten.  Other than that, I haven't directed anyone in my real life to my blog.  Part of me wants to wait until there's a significant amount of content actually written (I'm still sub-fifty posts).  But maybe another part of me does want it to be a bit anonymous.  Or at least not shared with people who wouldn't enjoy it or understand my motivation.  The secret blog of Mary-Michael.

So, here are my questions to all bloggers:Did you make a conscious decision to blog publicly or anonymously?  Have you ever regretted putting information on your blog, or experienced any repercussions from it?  Any other input you have would be most appreciated.