I guess I'm not alone

A recent study, nicely summarized and discussed here, suggests that blogging can make you happier. As Dr. Grohol writes in his psychology blog:

The researchers found support for deeper self-disclosure from bloggers resulting
in a range of better social connections. These included things such as a sense
of greater social integration, which is how connected we feel to society and our
own community of friends and others; an increase in social bonding (our tightly
knit, intimate relationships); and social bridging — increasing our
connectedness with people who might be from outside of our typical social
network.

This matches my experience. Poker is in some senses a social game, but I find nearly all of the interactions from it superficial (when they are not downright annoying). There are a few exceptions. But for the most part, I have, paradoxically, felt far more of a sense of connection with other people when sitting completely alone in front of my computer than when sitting in a large poker room with a hundred of my fellow human beings. The process of telling all of you about myself, finding that you're interested in what I have to say, reading your feedback, and perusing the blogs of others who are more or less similarly situated has been genuinely fulfilling, whereas playing poker for a living is mostly a very lonely experience--at least that has been my experience of it. I have unquestionably made more and closer friends through this blog than I have across the green felt.

A couple of years ago I read somewhere (can't remember where) that worldwide the average readership of a blog post was less than one; i.e., the typical entry doesn't get read by anybody except the author. If that were the case here, I would have shut it down long ago, and thus missed out on the rewarding experience. So this is another good occasion to thank you for reading and commenting. I'm glad you enjoy it enough to check in once in a while. In the end, though, I'm pretty sure that I get more out of it than any of you do.