Five Years

I have been blogging and on Twitter for almost five years (officially five years on March 25^th). It seems like a lot longer. I feel like I’ve always been blogging and on Twitter.

Then again, I now have a six-year-old and almost seven-year-old, and often, I can barely remember a time when I wasn’t a mother. And that’s not a bad thing, either.

Through my work (and, while I enjoy these two activities immensely, it is work), I have met and connected so many wonderful people, learned so much, and had a number of fantastic opportunities I would not have had otherwise.

And, you know, a new career.

I’m pretty proud of the fact that my old blog still gets over 2,000 hits a month, and that people still find it and link to it in their own blog posts and other webtexts. I’ve unfortunately had to turn off the comments, only because most of the more recent comments were spam, and it was getting too cumbersome to keep blocking them. But the conversation keeps going on Twitter and here and at conferences and in academic essays.

So, thank you to Mary Churchill for encouraging me and mentoring me. Thank you to Scott Jaschik who took and chance and gave me a larger platform for my words. Thanks to the 6,893 followers on Twitter who have decided (often, I imagine, through the wisdom of Twitter’s suggestion algorithm) to put up with my filling their timeline. And to the 6k+ people I follow who make me a smarter person.

I write because I can’t imagine not writing. That anyone reads what I write, to me, continues to be miraculous. Maybe you think it’s pretty miraculous (or ridiculous) that anyone reads me either. I am aware that this is an incredible privilege, and my aim was always to try and be better and do better. I love the blogging and the tweeting because it is iterative, it is collaborative, and it keeps me connected.

Here’s to another five years and beyond, on whatever platform where we’re sharing our words in the future.