Why should I want to start a blog?

It is neither a case of vanity nor idleness, though I say so myself. I have been counselling people on almost every matter under the sun and giving encouragement and telling stories for well-nigh a quarter century, besides writing a considerable amount, both fiction and other stuff, and teaching all the time, with a short stint at journalism thrown in in between. Willy-nilly I have learnt a few interesting things about life and living, which I feel a never-ending urge to share with as many people as I can. Some of my ex-pupils, both young and not so young, have often expressed a wistfuless that they cannot keep in close and face-to-face contact any more; and disappointment that many of their friends have never had the chance to meet me and listen to me talk; some have even seen things I have written on the Net, and suggested that I start up a blog of my own. Hence this experiment. I would like my own old boys and girls to look up this site and post their comments and questions here first – then they might tell some friends to do the same. I have no desire whatever to impose myself as a fountain of wisdom upon the world: God knows there are too many like that around already, and I never thought that I was such a clever and profound person anyway. But it so happens that a very large number and variety of folks do keep looking me up and asking me about all sorts of things, from aeroplanes to love affairs, from literature to ecology, from health issues to career choices, so I thought that perhaps it mightn’t be a bad idea if I tried doing on the Net what I have naturally done for so many years with people face to face, so that my ‘net’ could be spread much wider, and a whole lot more people might derive the same kind of harmless enjoyment, if not benefit, that so many people close to me have done. Let’s see whether we can set a good thing going!
July 8, 2006