What I Learned from Reading 20 Years of My Blog Posts

this title is so long it could be an old-school Fall Out Boy song

I’ve been meaning to write this post since last year, when I went through each and every post on my blog since 2020. My motivation was partly curiosity, vanity–to remove anything I don’t want any the Internet any longer–and practical–to free up space and remove dead links. During the process, I deleted about half of my 1200 posts, so I accomplished the latter two goals with ease. I left up some posts but changed some pretty cringeworthy internet lingo du jour.

As for my curiosity, I was pleasantly surprised. I was expecting mostly site updates–and there were plenty of those–and a lot of not-always-teenaged angst, depression, and anxiety. So much of my life felt so very dark for a long time. And while I saw some posts of that type, there were far fewer than I expected. Maybe I hadn’t written during some of those tough times. Perhaps my memory is clouded by my strong feelings and things were better than they felt.

At the very least, I was surprised by the sheer quantity of posts mentioning–or speaking to (Hi Ben!)–my friends. And so many of those people are still in my life. I was–and am–so very loved, and I feel incredibly grateful for that. I’ve known many of my close friends for over two decades, and I realize how uncommon this is and how lucky I am. I especially felt grateful after my divorce, when I returned home to so many open arms, even from those who rightfully had reasons to feel frustrated with me. I had a new lease of life and was the best version of Cole I ever had been, and I felt like my loved ones had stuck by me through the times when I was at my worst. Perhaps I was more redeemable than I had realized.

I had a similar feeling while going through my blog posts. As a person in my mid-thirties, I felt sympathy and compassion for the younger person who wrote those words, not (secondhand) embarrassment. It was a much-needed reminder during a difficult time in my life that I had value, so much that people have remained in my life for over 20 years. I wrote about parties with Ashley, who I recently shopped and hiked with, and road trips with Oli, who sends me a message about how much they miss me as soon as they return home to Minneapolis after a weekend together. I could write half a dozen of sentences like the two previous ones. Going through my blog posts was for me, I imagine, like pouring through old photo albums for some people.

Yet the exercise was bittersweet. For as many people who will be my lifelong ride-or-die friends, there were a seemingly equal number who were significant enough to write about at the time, were only blips on the radar of my life. Some people, mostly Internet friends, I struggle to remember at all. Multiple people have since passed.

And there is no way to go through 20 years of your own blog posts without seeing the evolution of the Internet and all its trends. My first blog was on Blogger, and I hand-coded my layouts, after all! It was an evolution to move to SSI, then PHP and WordPress, and the countless site update posts showed just how much I enjoyed the tasks and projects I created for myself along the way (and may be undertaking again…).

But the Internet isn’t what it once was and never will be again. Something, perhaps nameless, is long gone. I can–and do–lament with some of my friends, but I will miss the particular feelings of creation, potential, and community, among others, that I could only achieve at certain points in time. After all, going through my blog posts would be a wholly different endeavor in 20 years due to changes in quality and quantity. On the other hand, I’m likely experiencing something at this point in time–whether my life in general or as I type these words–over which I will feel nostalgia at some point in the future, so at least I have that to look forward to!

Funny how looking backward can make you look forward, too.