My mind is weedy with words, my peeps. I take dictation from my brain and, damn, it won’t let up. Words. All. The. Time.
This is probably why I ain’t no hollaback girl in Twitterland. I crave some hollas back, but that 140-character limit stumps me. Too much like a cocktail party with no food or cocktails, just witty one- or two-liners zinging overhead. I’m not saying I don’t try. Been trying to Twitter, I have. But the banter flies and I’m here transcribing the epic poems in my head and Justin Timberlake never ever writes me back and asks me to thumb-wrestle…well. I’ll just take my invisible pigs-in-a-blanket outside.
I have been blogging since May 2005. How about that? I am officially one of the long-standing “mommy bloggers.” It suits me. But plain old blogging (without product reviews, without interviews, without vlogs and podcasts) is passe now. Traffic is way down at BEAW, because I’m kind of over here doing my own thang, and that can get old. Ask Spot the Wonder Dog, who ran away. Polar bears bummed out hole in the roof yadda yadda yadda. Meh.
Yup. Jenny’s groove thang is not everybody’s groove thang, I realize. Sometimes I think, I should be doing more, talking up bleach and flea spray and books by successful author types.
Then I think: Meh.
The Brunette Ambition Tour.
It’s interesting to see which posts get the most hits. Funny posts are good. Straightforward parenting posts with rotten or adorable kids are good. Cat-and-dog stories are good. Gardening and home un-improvements: good.
Narcolepsy and kosher kitchens used to be good. Nakedness or sex are good for traffic, if not FF (Friendly Factor, see: The Boston Globe).
But, ew, YUCK, cooties! Poetry, depression, bipolar, divorce—that’s an intensely loyal but small posse of readers willing to put up with that crap. You? Hi! Hi! When I am too glum, traffic goes way down and stays that way until I get my happy shiz back on. How about you other bloggers? What have you noticed about traffic patterns?
For the most part, I just keep plodding along, because this is a constant in my life. A record. I sure like that. I sure need that. The blog is always there. You’re there. Thanks for that. The themes have evolved since 2005. Wish that weren’t so sometimes, but I guess that’s the way it goes, this whole grownup bloggy scene. Aging gracefully, ungracefully, and willingly in front of a crowd.
So anyway, I thought maybe for a change I’d blurt out a few posts in a Twitter-sized Choose Your Own Adventure sort of way. That way I get a little Twitter practice. And you can read the titles, and kind of read whatever you want, and hand over the funnies or the glummies or the world news or the sports to the next reader.
Okay, there will be no sports. Unless you want to play dodgeball with me. I like dodgeball, always did. Email me, Justin Timberlake. Or, you know, put your tweet in the box.
{ 33 comments… read them below or add one }
I always liked dodgeball, too — it was the one “sport” I had a fighting chance at. Sure wish I could apply my elementary strategies to all the thoughtballs being tossed around in my head, but it’s kinda like dodgeball on crack up there. No rhyme, no reason, no rules. Just really really fast and hard ALL.THE.TIME.
Never mind those chased off by the glum. Easier said than done, I know. Having all those numbers stare back at you somehow validates the time you spend on here, right? Even though this is supposed to be about you, somehow there’s a little bit of it that is all about them. Or maybe I’m just projecting. Anyways, what I’m trying to say is that sometimes your glum is what keeps me going. Not in an evil “nanny nanny boo boo” kind of way, but in a “wait a minute, maybe I’m not all alone in this”. You have tremendous courage to put the glum out there for those like me who aren’t strong enough to face the glum, to admit to the glum. Your glum is often the shelter I seek for my own — a safe little place to go and pull it out and examine it and try to come to terms with it. Reading your soul-in-words is like a quick shot of cortisone to my own wounds — the little boost I need to find the energy to dig yet another layer off on my journey towards the sun. Someday maybe I’ll be brave enough to post my own glum. Maybe then we’ll have more than just the dodgeball in common.
Does your traffic record include people who read you on RSS? I read faithfully but almost never come to your actual site. I like you whatever mood you’re in.
I’ve noticed similar patterns. Back when I started my blog (summer 07), I tried to be funny. I tried to be Bossy and Dooce and you and Finslippy all rolled into one (ah, right). But then I started going through something, through many somethings. And I said, Screw the Funny. This is my emotional dumping ground. And my traffic, which was never all that impressive to begin with, dipped. Then it plummeted.
Recently someone has discovered me on Stumble Upon and All Adither is enjoying the best traffic of its life. But I know it won’t last.
I say, be true. Blog what you feel and what you want. That’s why we come here.
I have the same question as ailo. I read you by Google Reader, and I read every single post you write. I don’t comment but rarely, but my thoughts are always with you.
I think your honesty about your emotions is amazing, and I feel I know you, because you don’t post all happy crap all the time. By posting the dark and twisty stuff, you are letting us see all of you, and I for one, love you for it. If I’m ever up on that side of the country, I’d totally want to come over and have coffee.
No dodgeball though, I was better at kickball.
p.s.- Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind. -Dr. Seuss
You are so lovely. But if you start talking up bleach and flea spray I will wince. Don’t go changin’.
I don’t comment often, but I’m one of your loyal readers. Hi. Hi.
I would have to have made a more recent post than January 2009 to take note of any traffic stats. Blogging seems to be getting rather passe rather quickly. Why, I ask you, WHY?!
“Oh my god, you still blog? That’s so cute! I remember posting to bulletin boards back when 9600 baud was the SHIT!”
“You posted to bulletin boards? Wow! I remember waiting two hours to download five seconds worth of green-and-black ASCII porn to my Apple ][e!”
“You downloaded porn to a computer? I have fond memories of glossy magazine pages, and we liked it that way, dammit!”
“You had glossy magazines? Wow, all we had back in the day were written accounts in these fancy books!”
“You had books? I was content with a scroll, dagnabbit, and I still am!”
“A scroll? What the heck’s wrong with this clay tablet I have right here? It’s not THAT heavy!”
“A clay tablet? Pshaw!! I have several centuries’ of oral tradition memorized and am intent on passing it down to future generations with nary a scrap of detail lost, my friends!”
“Oral tradition? What’s that? I’m too busy hunting fast meat in order to secure sustenance for my progeny and insulating skins and furs for my tribe to talk about stuff like that!”
**Frowns suspiciously. Grunts in an effort of communication that is perceived to be received accurately. Beats chest.**
**Swings from tree. Mates with anything it can get its hands on. Pees randomly. Smells finger.**
**Runs from stupidly large terrestrial lizard. Cowers in fear. One day they’ll get theirs!**
**Glares fearfully at land. Returns to ocean. Too scary up there!**
**Filters seawater for sustenance. These waving cilia that make propulsion possible are where it’s at!**
**Multi-cellular now?! It can’t get any better or more complex than this!**
**Bonds with another amino acid in a gloopy soup of potential life-forming ooze.**
**Martians pack up test equipment and take off, leaving garbage behind. Nothing of significance could possibly occur on THIS planet.**
I’m still here and loving you. (For what it’s worth.)
I think it’s VERY HARD to track traffic because so many people use feed readers now, which doesn’t get tracked. So you might have a hundred times the readers you ever did, but most of them could be the non-commenting type who read in readers.
I read you in a reader, so you’ll see my hit only if I comment. I read your depression/bipolar/divorce posts with INTENSE INTEREST, but generally don’t click through to comment, because….because….well, because it’s hard to comment. I’m not going to say “IT WILL GET BETTER, JENN!!” because who am I to promise such a crazy thing? And nothing else seems right either.
Jenn,
You’re a great writer and you’re honest and THAT is good enough for me.
Rachel @ 6512 and growing
I never track traffic, that is too much like work! But I do adore comments! XOFifi Pee Ess Any way that you are, that is who we love. You.
I once posted a funny picture of a macaroni penguin and still get TONS of hits for that entry. So much so that I finally went back and added a bunch of links to more information about macaroni penguins. I still get excited every time I log on to check my stats but then I remember that two-thirds of the hits are for the damn penguin.
First, Simon is brilliant.
Second, so are you. I always read (also via a reader) and I often say a prayer for you (hope you don’t mind), mostly for peace. I seldom comment, though, because my words always seem so ungainly after your always graceful ones and because I can’t ever find any that seem like more than platitudes. I am a stranger, so how can it help at all that I feel your pain and I hurt for you and rail at the unfairness of life on your behalf? I do, and I am a faithful lurking reader and I hope you never stop writing here.
I read you religiously on google reader.
I love blogs and read severall faithfully, but I must say that your blog is one of my favorites because you are so real and your writing shows that some days are funny and quirky and some days are devastatingly painful. Who wants cheery, cheery all the time? I myself can’t handle the sticky sweetness. And, if you ever started product reviews and “celebrity” interviews” I would cringe more than a little. I am here because you are brave enough to share yourself. I could care less about the latest brand of whatever to hit the market.
Yeah, I miss Spot too. But Simon rocks!!
“Aging gracefully, ungracefully, and willingly in front of a crowd.
That’s what I like about you and your writing.
I’m late to comment, but I read everything you post. A lot of the time, though, it’s like tonight: a week’s worth of posts at a time.