What I Don't Show You (and Why I Blog Carefully)

I once showed a picture of our living room on Facebook—I can't remember what prompted it—and a friend commented that she truly hoped that what lay outside the photograph was messy and cluttered, because what the photo showed was way too neat and clean.

So today I'm going to show you what I want to show you around the yard, and then what I don't want to show you. Come along.

Here is our one of our beautiful seating areas. Isn't it pretty and inviting?

And here is a hand in a dumptruck.

Here is another picturesque bench.

And the broken down shed right behind it that I carefully cut out of the above picture.

Here is the cute blue chair that welcomes friends:

with all the junk right next to it for real:

 Here is a pretty lily in the back flower bed.

Here is a 19-year-old fire truck that was recently discovered in the tangle of poison ivy and brush in the back yard. 

Here is a carefully edited picture of our front flower bed, cropped to eliminate the distractions of people's butts bending over in the background, the broken-down yellow shed (see above), the random toys scattered about, and the bird bath that hosts a party of mosquito larvae.

Here is said bird bath.

Here is the lovely fire we enjoyed last night, on a rare cool evening in June.

 Here is the "bad guy named Joe" that Duncan nailed together and then burned in the fire.

I could go on and on. I haven't even showed you the weedy garden, the English ivy growing over the tree that we never moved when a storm knocked it over, or the poke weed growing up in the middle of the ornamental crab-apple tree.

I've been thinking a lot about this lately, about how we, as bloggers, can pick and choose what we show you, our readers. I can share with you as little or as much as I wish to. I can show you who I am in bits and pieces. I can give you tips and techniques for homeschooling, or perhaps sometimes touch something in your soul with a slice of life.

But here is what I want to say. A lot goes on in SmallWorld that you don't know about. I decided long ago never to tell stories that might hurt someone else, even if those stories are partly my stories. I don't share personal struggles that my kids go through, or things that are happening in my friends' or families' lives. It's not because I am scared to show you who I am, but because I believe in protecting people's privacy.

I had a professor in graduate school who insisted that I couldn't tell a story without telling someone else's part of the story. I disagree. 

I could tell tragic stories that would shoot my blog stats into Mom-blogger Stardom. But those stories would hurt other people, even if I don't particularly like those other people. Even if I'd kind of like to hurt those other people. Even if those other people hurt me.

Oh, don't worry. Nothing is happening in SmallWorld that is cause for concern. I've just been distressed for the past several weeks because of a blogger who is hurting a friend over and over again, pouring salt on a very open wound. I don't ever want to be that person.

And so, I give you  as real as I can be without dragging anyone down or revealing a story that might embarrass or hurt someone else.  And sometimes, I just give you the beautiful because I really, truly do have a beautiful life.