I started blogging because of a girl.

It’s true. Five years ago, I dipped my toe into the zany world of blogging so a crush of mine could be impressed by my witty, deep thoughts.

Once that relationship fizzled, my blog morphed into a silly, bipolar collection of rants much like the one you see today.

Still, it all began because of a girl. And, one way or another, “a girl” has been my blogging muse ever since.

After the first girl came and went, I continued blogging. I did this mostly because I enjoyed it, but also because I wanted her, if she ever visited, to see how well I was doing. Yes, we men are such fragile creatures.

Somehow, blogging led me to the next girl in my life. She found my blog, read my amusing/annoying anecdotes, saw my dashingly-handsome profile picture, and contacted me.

She lived in Minnesota. Eventually, we met. Eventually, we became a couple. Eventually, she picked up and moved across the country to be with me. And eventually, and sadly, we discovered it just wasn’t meant to be and went our separate ways.

That relationship lasted thirteen months. During that time, most of my blog posts were inspired by her in some way, shape or form. For example, my “Man Narrowly Misses Watching Chick Flick” post was inspired by a visit to Blockbuster we had. She wanted to rent the Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker rom-com Failure to Launch. I, on the other hand, want to die a slightly less painful death.

My silly “Hey Jealousy” post was inspired by a pair of shoes I owned that were loathed by this particular girl.

“That Guy”, my epic call to arms where I implored my fellow man to stop holding the purses of their wives and girlfriends was inspired by, well, our running joke where I refused to hold this girlfriend’s purse whenever we went shopping.

The next few months found me blogging, mostly, as a coping mechanism. It gave me something to do. It took my mind off things. The occasional venture into the dating world also helped take my mind off things, but blogging was the main distraction. I twice redesigned my blog. I averaged several new posts a week. I made “making my blog popular” a priority.

The resulting increase in traffic eventually led to two new acquaintances within a span of just a few weeks. And yes, by “acquaintances” I mean girls.

I never met the first girl, but we became great friends. For about five months, she inspired (and once actually wrote) my blog posts. And even though during this period of time the thought of her marrying someone would have agreed with me like an Obama speech agrees with Congressman Joe Wilson, when she married a great Christian man last March I couldn’t have been happier for her.

The second girl I did get to meet.

I am not going to go into specifics, but I will say I believe I became smitten with her back in January of last year. That is when I received an e-mail from her that contained references to Christmas, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Bill Maher and gum ulcers. And, yes, I realize “Bill Maher” and “gum ulcers” are redundant.

That e-mail also included a smiling photo.

Numerous phone calls, e-mails, text messages and months later, I got to meet her. That meeting eventually inspired a particularly melancholy blog post about missed opportunities and the hope for second chances.

The tone and scope of my blog changed that day. Sometimes, I wrote to inspire myself. Sometimes, I wrote to occupy my time. Mostly, I wrote in the hopes that doing so would help this particular girl not forget about me.

With almost an entire year now passed and my readership down to a level that could rival the number of members in Emilio Estevez’s fan club, the time has come where I need to rethink my purpose for blogging.

Who am I writing for?

Truth be told, this blog should never have been about any one person (or series of persons), unless that person was me. I don’t need a muse. I don’t need any one person to read what I write in order to validate what I write. This blog needs to be about making numerous people, yours truly included, think and laugh.

That’s why I blog.

Or, at least it’s why I will blog from this moment on.