I just checked and I started this blog 13 years ago this month. So far I’ve done 1,307 posts with a couple actually worth reading. WordPress says I have 4,333 followers with some 25,992 comments. Well, okay, 12,032 of those are me replying to other people’s comments. My average post gets around 32 likes and six or seven comments. These aren’t get numbers by any internet blogging standard, but it’s the best blogging results I’ve ever had.
Okay, I only have one blog, so there’s not much to compare it to.
I started this blog as a way to just get into consistently writing something every week. That kind of worked, I have managed a lot of posts, but what really got me writing here was when I was when I started treatment for cancer. That just clicked something over in my brain and I wrote a lot. In time I moved on from that subject to others, including pizza — which is a more pleasant conversation than cancer treatments.
At the time I considered myself a prose writer and thought that I’d try and write a novel or short stories or something. I started working on a novel, but I’ve not finished it. A year or two after I finished my cancer treatments, I thought I’d write a book about the experience, but when I sat down to write that, it all came out as poetry. I blame the radiation — must have changed something in my brain. These days I don’t call myself a writer, but rather a poet (even though I don’t post much poetry here).
When I get to this time of year and the arrival of spring, I think about this blog, my writing practices and think about whether or not I should change anything. Maybe stop blogging, do some videos, actually work on that novel, start a new blog … lots of thoughts race through my brain. I don’t know. I might. One problem with blogging for this long is that at times I find myself rewriting the same blog post I did years ago. I didn’t look it up, but I know I’ve written this post about blogging a few times.
I know all bloggers have times when they think it might be time to stop or time to change. I follow a lot of blogs and they come and go. Some people write consistently for awhile and then just stop. A small number of blogs I follow have been going longer than mine. Some folks announce when they’re quitting and some just stop. Strangely enough, I can name three blogs that I’ve followed where the blogger has died — all of them good blogs.
This isn’t the post I sat down to write, but it’s the post that came out. I won’t make any startling announcements today, but am just saying I’m thinking about stuff.
You may hear more or less from me. You may see a video or two. I might even start a blog about theology or perhaps start a YouTube channel on making pizza.
All I really know is that it’s almost dinner time here and I have to go.
Andrew's View of the Week 