The Small Matter of … Blogging

I used to blog.

Once.

Before it became all cool and du jour.

Before it became cool and dujour ...

I loved it. I loved the community that it created. The positivity it spread. The happiness it filled me with.

I’m forever grateful for my early blogging days; for the opportunities they provided me with and the growth they ensured.

But then I stopped blogging.

Because I just didn’t feel it anymore. Because I grew out of it. Because life led me elsewhere. Because it seemed everyone had a story about how blogging had led them to some sort of success, and I don’t like sharing the same stories as others.

Because people got competitive. And negative. And I hate that.

I stopped because, wherever I looked, it seemed anyone and everyone was a blogger. Anyone and everyone was a writer, almost by default, simply because they had a blog. And I don’t think they are the same thing.

I blog, because I write. I don’t write to blog.

I am a writer. For me, blogging is the default. I stopped blogging because I began to resent being called a blogger. I wrote before I blogged, for years and years, and I wrote after I blogged. I never did it to be cool. Or to launch a career.

I did it because I love to write.

I resented being called a blogger because I seriously loathed being put into group that started to increasingly include sixteen year old emos that couldn’t spell, middle aged perverts and people seeking fame. Because, as with everything in life, when something is new and unknown and you’re doing it – you’re ahead of the pack. You’ve got vision. But when everyone is doing it, it’s old. It’s regular. It’s beyond passé.

And I don’t do regular.

But I always do what I love. And, as I’ve recently discovered, blogging is something I love.

I’ve missed it. And the community it creates. And the positivity it spreads. And the happiness it fills me with.

I’m now prepared, more assured of myself than ever, to be placed into a category that includes sixteen year old emos that can’t spell, middle aged perverts and people seeking fame because I know that I am not any of them. I’m not afraid to be a blogger.

Bad grammar, spelling, perverts and fame seekers aside – we’re a good bunch of people. Dedicated, inspired and utterly talented. And that’s a collective I’m more than willing to associate myself with.

So, here I am, a little older, a lot wiser and still full of words. I feel a strange nostalgia lining the blank page of a WordPress portal after some time away, but I also feel a slight tingling coming out of my fingertips as I hit the keys of my laptop, an occasional kick from a stray butterfly in my stomach – I’m excited, about new opportunities and new growth.

I’m excited about sharing my ideas, and thoughts, and photography, and ambitions, and writing and musings with people that think and feel and hope and imagine.

I hope you’ll join me on my new journey, in my new place, In The Thick Of It.

* First published on In The Thick Of It

Image courtesy of BitchBuzz on Flickr