Three years!

Sometime in the past year, I signed up with Blogoversary to remind me of the day the blog was begun. About two weeks ago, I started a post inspired by two friends and went off on a tangent. I do this often, but I cut that part out of that post that day. (If you're wondering, Mr. Linky and I have decided we can no longer be friends...unless I someday have readership ten times greater than what I do now. That was a stunning failure if ever I saw one!)

Today marks three years of writing this blog. The original inspiration was reading Polly PI's blog at the insistence of a friend. Heather would nag me and tell me I should do the same, that I'd be good at it (I'll let you be the judges on that front). She kept at it and kept at it. Finally, I figured that I should give it a try.

**If you go to Polly's blog, you'll notice that she dropped out of the blogosphere. While I miss her posts, somehow, I think she and the Light Haired Man are enjoying many adventures and are far too busy to post.**

New to the blogging thing, I found a blog here and a blog there to read. Amalah was one of the first that was my personal crack. Noah was a tiny little guy when I started reading, and for weeks, I went back through the archives. Damn, this woman was FUNNY!

For a long time, there were just a handful of you: Ed, Donna, Joyce, Jeff, Jill, Bob and Heather. Then my YaYa sisters here and there. I told people I blogged, but didn't share the URL with the world. Most comments were made in phone calls or IMs. The most common comment? "Write more, damn you!" My posts every three or four days weren't enough for some of you (and you know who you are!). Then I decided to add another blog and Blogger didn't like that. Really hated the idea, in fact, so I had issues with logging in for a long time and didn't blog for a portion of 2006.

I wanted to, and now, I wish it HAD worked, because I'd have more stories of the job I enjoyed so much saved for posterity. The trip to California needed to be documented, so I forced through and decided to delete the original incarnation of Wine and Foodies. (and the current version has been mostly ignored due to lack of new wine, new dining experiences and efforts with Blog 365. It will return.)

A curious thing happened, I started getting comments. From people I didn't even know. When I added a sitemeter (because Mandy had one), I noticed that there are people who read here regularly that I don't even know. Imagine that! I tried to figure out who these people were. It was funny to realize that someone was even reading on vacation. Still, if I went five days without writing something, one of you would ask/badger.

Then the leg fell to pieces. The blog became a coping device, with many 3am entries. I later was contacted by one of the companies that provided an item used for treatment, and linked them to 46 entries (to that time) about the vascular issues.

When I took disability from work, I had more time to write and read other blogs. Along the way, I found out about NaBloPoMo and decided to jump in. I wanted to increase my audience and find more blogs to read (I was up to about 25 readers a day at that time.) Writing every day was a little intimidating, but not too much. I started a little list of blog topics, just in case I ran out of ideas. That original list of twelve still has seven of the beginning topics on it, eleven months later.

NaBloPoMo was great for expanding my audience AND my daily blog fixes. I'm not sure who was first, but Lotus, http://www.imaginarybinky.com/, Saffa, Jess, Mary and Shannon all came from that event, along with a few others. I found new stuff to read, to inspire me and oh, some more people to visit my blog, too.

The thirty days was at an end and a day of rest was looking mighty inviting, but then: Holidailies! That one cemented the habit of writing every day, so when Blog365. reared it's head, I was ready. I picked up some more awesome reads and some more awesome support.

I'm saving most of the particulars about Blog365 to celebrate the end of it, but here it is, 9 full months in, and I've kept up. (Came close a couple of times, but some posts in the last half hour of the day got in!) Back in November, if you'd told me that I would be here writing every day nearly a year later, I would have told you that you were nuts, because 30 was so intimidating.

I'm so glad that Heather convinced me to do this. The writing process is great for many reasons: the friends made, the memories saved, the connections maintained. I'm even more happy that you all have come along for the ride and haven't run screaming!

Three years and lots of memories here. May I be able to continue for many more...

Comments

Joyce-Anne said…
Whoohoo! Happy Blogaversary!

Sorry you and Mr. Linky are no longer friends.
Jess said…
Happy Blogoversary! Glad you're here!
It really flies by, huh? I hit 1 Year mid-September and I forgot about it... never said a word. Dork!

Glad to have met you at NaBloSomeGoats, dear! :-)

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