Blog vs. diary

Back in bangalore now. An interesting point Smita brought up for not using a blog for her journal while I did, was of privacy. What all, that happened to me in these 3 weeks, can I put down in my blog? I find there's a sizeable chunk of memories of bland, sweet, bitter, tangy, spicy and other tastes that are not going to go in here. Is a blog, then, just a mode for outward expression for extroverts? What about others who actually feel for and about many people and things, want to write about them, but not show but a few close people. Maybe blogs should have a "share" feature so that articles can be read by only particular people.

A diary is something quite personal to you. Back in school when I did maintain one, mostly to jot down my second face experiences, I sometimes narrated for someone else reading it, and sometimes recounted for me reminiscing. But I knew if someone does read my diary, it will be with my consent. So, in went the details of every experience without refinement or reservations. Can't do that here, can I?

I actually liked my way of mixing up hindi and english seamlessly, and consciously avoided writing the hindi portions in Roman script. I can't do that in the blog. Well, actually I can... ऐसे, पर जहमत बहुत करनी पडेगी! And well, no one can take away the old-world charm of the diary. Leafing through well-thumbed yellowing pages to relive your life...

In favor of the blog is the maintainability, ease-of-use and most importantly the throughput. Everyone types faster than writes nowadays. And when a thought strikes a software engineer, he can start typing them after a couple of mouse clicks or hotkey-strokes, depending on his nerdity. Not so with diaries.

I guess I'll maintain them both, the balanced middle-path guy that I am.