Novitiate Notes goes global.

Attentive (and frequent) visitors to this blog may notice that there's now a small world map in a little white box below the sidebar on the right. This map, produced by an outfit called ClustrMaps, is a hit counter intended to give an idea of where in the world my readership comes from. Adding a hit counter to this blog is a big step for me; until now I've resisted introducing a hit counter for the simple reason that I don't really care how many hits I get. The initial and still primary mission of Novitiate Notes is to keep my family and friends reasonably up to date on what and how I'm doing in my life as a Jesuit novice. Over time, I've come to realize that a blog like this necessarily has a wider mission as well - given its authorship and content, it also serves as a means of evangelization and vocation promotion. That said, I'm less concerned about how many people I reach through this blog than I am about who I am reaching. I'd like to learn more about my readership, which includes getting a better sense of where my readers live. Anecdotally, I know that Novitiate Notes has been read by individuals in various parts of the United States and in international cities as diverse as Baden-Baden, Manila and Rome. Hopefully this new hit counter will give me a better sense of who's looking at this site, and hopefully it will yield a few surprises. The way I look at it, it could be a great success or a glorious failure. One way or another, I'm going to try it out - ad experimentum, of course. AMDG.