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Blog Sisters are here

Women blog for many reasons. But most of all, to connect, writes SHONALI MUTHALALY

A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle. Irina Dunn, 1970

But, "This fish needs a bicycle. If not for comfort, at least for entertainment's sake."

She's a blogger. If you haven't already figured that out. Because, in the virtual world, people like `This Fish Needs A Bicycle' can speak out. And really talk.

Which could explain why the Internet is alive with women bloggers discussing love and life, marriage, families, work and children. But mostly, love.

Till now, there was nowhere women could actually air their feelings. In everyday life, there are always Things You Cannot Say. Especially if you are young. Especially if you want to get married someday. Or be accepted as a responsible mother/wife or daughter.

When you're an anonymous, and vocal, presence on the Internet, all these rules slip away.

`This Fish Needs a Bicycle,' for instance, is an achingly honest blog about life, written by a young woman who is on the lookout for `true love,' but is willing to take whatever comes along till then. Because, as she says, "People sometimes talk about life in terms of milestones - birthdays, marriage, babies. When you're seventeen, you're waiting for eighteen... when you're dating, you're waiting to meet The Right One and settle down. So much waiting." So she adds, she's decided to enjoy the small moments of perfection, to "collect these vignettes and dwell on things like rows of strawberries and extra long hugs," because, "otherwise, I feel like I might always be waiting for the Next Big Thing to happen. And always being more than a little bit afraid that it won't."

Real face of women

A palpable feature of women bloggers is their fearlessness in confronting the truth about their lives — both the present and the future. Contrary to what Ally McBeal, Bridget Jones and every other frothy commercial chick-flick would have us believe, these bloggers, in many ways, represent the real face of women today: strong, intelligent and remarkably clear headed when it comes to romance.

Jimmy, for instance, uses her blog "as a reminder that I have it in me to be strong and to be my own hero. To pick myself up and dust myself off and to look for an ice cream sundae to reward myself ... To remind myself that there is hope yet and in spite of it all, I am lucky to have travelled so much, learnt so much and to have loved so much."

Bridal Beer, a lawyer in Kolkata, is an obstinate survivor too. She describes herself as "Single, 20s, was briefly in love... in New York for long enough to miss it. Now I am in India, training to be a wife-for-life to a relative stranger (not a stranger who is a relative, we don't do those)."

And although she's clearly pining for her New York boyfriend Brian, she takes her prospective arranged marriage with equanimity, because she realises she must. "Tomorrow, I have a date with a Would-Be's dad. This is really a Cannot-Be, yet I dine and date. Otherwise my parents will make it difficult for me to enjoy the creature comforts of a life here."

Caffeine and Nicotine (whose blog, by the way, is spiked with charming quizzes such as `Which antipsychotic drug are you?' and `What personality disorder are you?') writes to connect with not just women around her, but also men — for dating advice. "Ok. So I know this is ridiculous and I've probably already asked this on the blog before but I'm hoping maybe some of my male (and I know you're out there) readers will answer this.... What's the appropriate time to wait to call post-first-date? ... And is it OK for the girl to call?)" And while the community that blogs, and reads blogs, is usually supportive, most of these writers choose to remain anonymous, for obvious reasons.

As Bridal Beer puts it, "The Internet tells many tales and if my identity is revealed, I will age unmarried. Character-Checks are voices, inevitable, whispers, unwiped by software... Mixed report, sorry, no match, no marriage. And so in the interest of a dubious posterity, please let me remain anon."

After all, as Bad Mother says, keeping an online diary is like "slashing my wrists and haemorrhaging all over the computer screen."

And if you want to say exactly what you think, like `Charming But Single,' who maintains a `Dateless Journal of Drinking,' life's less complicated when people have no idea who you are, and how you think. "Everyone around me is obsessed with pairing up. To be blunt, there's a lot of pressure out there to jump on the marriage train and get your ticket punched, for better or for worse... I am, however, a bit fixated on relationships and dating and the stigma attached to both the single and the committed."

She speaks for legions of women. Which probably explains why women blogs are becoming the best contemporary literature around, not to mention the most honest. Because all women identify with at least some of it: Whether they're the types who dye their hair blue and run through dozens of biker boyfriends, or the types who wear arranged-marriage thalis around their necks and learn how to make perfect phulkas.

And the women who blog, do so for many reasons. Closure. Catharsis. But most of all, to connect.

And they say...

"Breaks-ups are hard not because it is difficult to let go, but it is impossible to stay." — Box of Blues

"She married one, loved another. He became her husband, the other her password." — Filthy Funny Flawed Gorgeous

He loves you. He loves you not. The wicked games he plays... `Perhaps, it is better off this way,' you think, as you slip a ring on to a stranger's finger and watch the world celebrate. — At My Most Beautiful

Aren't good looks an insane thing? You do nothing to achieve them they are God's gift to you, yet they can become your most prized outward possession. — British Born Confused Desi

At any point of time, there is always someone prettier than me in a room. In any room. Why for once, can't I at least be Ms. Dining Hall? ... Men, contrary to opinions expressed in women's magazines, don't notice `inner beauty' or 'a great sense of humour'. — Dwarf At Large

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