a couple of things happened at the same time which caused this.
1. i have been pretty miserable for at least half of my blogging life.
2. i thought i wanted to be a "professional" blogger.
i was a somewhat happy, crafty little high school/college student when i started out blogging. for many people back then, saying, "i blog" was another way of saying, "i keep an online diary." i wrote so much about personal things, but also about the things that i was creating. where i was going. about tv and movies i loved. it was super cool. then i got a job as a high school teacher, and i was just so busy and so frustrated most of the time that i could barely keep up with my work, let alone a chronicle of my life. let's not even get started on the fact that the kids were all on the internet. teachers have been fired for having photos of themselves drinking wine on their own personal facebook pages. not wanting to ruin my life, i let it drop off.
then, several years later, i was laid off and wanted to come back into the blog world, but there were all of these people making a LIVING from it now! i thought, whoa! i'd better get down on that. i'm an english teacher. i know how to write. i can do this.
so i started reading and learning about how to monetize your blog, and about making schedules, guest posters, advertising, positioning of images. niches. site maps. breadcrumbs!?? you name it. "every visitor is a potential customer." (eww.) i studied all of the blogs that liked to read, and tried styling my own after implementing their winning formulas and suggestions. i had everything set up. it looked fresh to death. and then i realized, "i'm not a fucking brand!"
i'm not. i'm just some snarky ass bitch living in south jersey, battling crushing depression, feeling physically shitty all the time, perpetually trying stay positive and look on the bright side and figure out my life and make it through. i can't pretend that it's all beautiful high-contrast low depth-of-field images in hazy sunlight. i WANT that. but i don't want to have to artfully choose when i'm going to drop the f-bomb because i might alienate new readers. i don't want to censor my true feelings because it might offend some random person passing by who might have otherwise clicked on one of my stupid ads. i don't want to have to pick and choose what i write about because certain topics might not fit the "theme" of my blog! i just want to remember my life. to have a record of it all, good or bad. discuss what's real, help/intrigue/entertain/identify with anyone else who's going through what i'm going through, and hopefully learn something new along the way.
so whatever, this is me doing my thing. nice to meet you.
