November is almost up and with it NaBloPoMo. I have some posts I wanted to get to and I’m realizing that even if I wrote one every night until Friday I wouldn’t be able to put them up. And there is no way I’ll write them this week, because grades are due and our new gradebook is the worst and I’m already overwhelmed and it’s only Monday.
I really do have some thoughts about this NaBloPoMo, about what amounts to me crashing this blogging community that already existed for a long time, after so many years of longing for some semblance of the blogging community I used to have. About how maybe I don’t need it as much anymore, because I have some really solid friends in the real world that I text with daily and see regularly. And maybe I do, because maybe blogging is about something different for me now, than the connection is used to provide. Suzanne asked, earlier in the month, about what blogging friendships have meant to those of us who write this way on the internet and I have so much to say about my own history of connection on the interwebs. Blogging friends were my only friends for a long time, or the only ones I interacted with on a daily basis. I have magnets on my fridge with pictures of blogging friends I ran a half marathon with in the summer of 2016. Two blogging friends were the only people invited to my wedding almost 10 years ago, who were not my parents or our friend who married us. There were years where my blogging community made up my whole social world.
And I’d love to write about why that was. About that special combination of sucking so hard at real world relationships, and needing to write to process my feelings. About how I can’t really articulate why I don’t need to process my life so vociferously these days. Why I don’t need to announce how I feel to the whole world so much anymore. Why most days I come here just to recap the day, a kind of writing I would never have engaged in 10 years ago. Back then I had thoughts and opinions and I needed to write thousands of words about them. These days I’m content to read a book or listen to a podcast. I just don’t feel the pull to create. I only have the head space most days to consume, and if I can manage to string words together, they won’t be about anything resembling a coherent thought.
Part of me thinks I need to shelve this post until I can finish it, but another part of me knows I won’t, and if I leave it on the shelf, I probably won’t take it down again, let alone send it out into the world. So maybe I’ll just press Publish even though it’s an incomplete (incoherent?) thought, sloppily tossed onto the “page,” and hope it’s not a total waste of everybody’s time.
I mean, it’s not like my recap of a busy week is that enthralling either. (winky face emoji)
I actually found it quite interesting and informative. THANK YOU.
And Good luck with the software and grading.
I do think it’s interesting how blogging and its importance in your life waxes and wanes with your life. I’m glad you didn’t delete this – it’s an important reminder that what is important RIGHT NOW might become unneeded in your life in the future.
I get this. My connection to blogging has definitely changed, but I still have many close friends (URL now IRL) thanks to those years. Kind of fun to hear I’m still on your fridge. 😉 I miss writing blog posts because of those connections, but like you I feel less of a need to share all of my thoughts on everything anymore (or maybe I’ve realized I had more to learn than I thought I knew 10 years ago?). We all keep changing!
So wait- you’re saying you don’t need us??? Just kidding ; ) I can see how your needs would change as you change, and your life changes. I’m still glad you joined NaBloPoMo though and I hope you stick around!
I am so very glad you joined our community, Noemi. Blogging doesn’t need to be the same it was ten years ago, but if you still feel it’s worthwhile to connect and share, even if it’s more mundane things, then this is what blogging should be RIGHT NOW.