A little after 'Do Saal'

Two years ago, around this time, while waiting for my final year medicine results to be out and the letters 'Dr' get added to my name, a thought struck me. That my thoughts could belong somewhere other than my diary. A blog maybe. I had two previous blogs. One was sort of a miscarriage and the other one was a poetry blog which I had made private. Hence I thought I could have a proper one which would be my space, where I could say anything I want without anybody's permission. Where it would be my rules all the time with a feel-good-factor after expressing my thoughts and views without being called a chatterbox! And hence, http://chandana-shekar.blogspot.com came into existence in the www world.

Then, it was history. I discovered I could write decent enough. I had never expected anybody would read what I write except for a couple of friends who were supportive of me writing. But then, people read. My blog was followed. Felt really good to be recognised for it. Getting appreciated by people from this virtual world was one feeling and colleagues stopping by in the hospital and saying, 'Hey I didn't know you write so well!' was another feeling. It was cloud nine everytime my family and friends got proud of me for what I wrote.

Started with scrap. Had absolutely no idea what to write on. Hence wrote an article on 'Aries Woman' because I am an aries by the book! And to this day, that article of mine is the one which gets most visitors, atleast 60% of the statistics!! Comes up on google search and there you go!! Has got 3,742 views till date. Going on, blogrolls happened, followers appeared, widgets got added, templates changed, facebook fan page got created and my soul smiled.

And then, this space and I grew together. Made friends. Few real good friends. Neha di and Nazish - My oldest followers. Neha di was and is someone I really admire. Never thought I could get so close to someone I meet in this virtual world. I remember she giving me the links to two of her friends' blogs so that I can get more idea about blogging. And now, Madam writes and writes big time herself ;-). Nazish was one loyal reader! Always supportive :). Thank you both of you :). Not just the articles, but thoughts that none of you got to read got shared with these people. Others joined the list. Bikram and I shared 'views' about people. The kind of people we analyzed then were of the same kind and it made it easy for us ;-). Few readers commented on my write-up just so that I would do the same on theirs. They kinda almost swore at me when I didn't do so. But there were a few of them who actually read mine because they wanted to read. That list is quite long, but I'm sure those people know that I'm talking about them. Blogger names appeared on facebook friends list and I felt glad to know such amazing people. Thanks all of you.

This year, two really exciting things happened. I started writing for N-zine, the online magazine. Its always a pleasure to write for it. Feels good to a part of a bunch of bloggers who take the pleasure of writing on a theme and make reading it a pleasure for those who do. Then Masthmysore came calling. Wrote an article called 'Mysore Mornings'. It stands to be among my favourites. Was a hit for sure and I was overwhelmed. That was again a pleasure. First thing was because my subject to write on was to be Mysore - the place I've been at since the time the surfactant on my lungs expanded, and the place I adore the most. Second, that website was created and run by a couple of engineers from here who did it for the love of Mysore. So everywhere I belonged to, everybody that writing associated me with, had a passion for words and phrases, or for my hometown. Felt perfect :-).

Every blogger considers his/her blog as a baby, and I'm no different. So happy and proud am I on this day that I can go on and on. Well, why shouldn't I be? To sit in my room alone, when the sky's dark and the world's snoozing, with just a qwerty at my fingertips, to express my joy, to vent out my anger, to get my creativity into words, to play with emotions, to make the characters in my mind wind into a story, to make random words rhyme, to boast about success, to crib about failure, for refreshment, for sobering down, for partying, for therapy, and much much more,... my blog's been my best friend sure. There's no wonder I love it so much. After all, it's 'The World Around Me'..

Thank you all for all your love and support. Thanks a ton :-)

Love you'll loads.

Chandana C. Shekar