Blog #11 On my recent blog hiatus...

Life happens

Editor/kid #3/social media expert. This is all your fault!!

Early in my participation in the blog writing game, with light bulbs illuminating and all kinds of blog-related opportunities exploding in my mind, I asked my editor/daughter Alyssa about how often she thought I should post. I had no idea what her answer might be. Daily? Monthly?? Bi-annually??? And also no idea of the repercussions her answer would carry. She casually remarked something like “Oh, every week or so should be about right...” So, in my naive initial enthusiasm, I figured I would try to hold to that frequency and see what happened. I should have known something obvious—like life itself, would happen. I made it about 10 weeks before the overwhelming convergence of moving from our house of 23 years to a new, smaller town life, along with Christmas, family and all things holiday related brought many previously important parts of my life, including the blog, to a screeching halt. The ethereal and self-cleansing act of blog writing was moved to some distant back burner, only to be replaced by things more necessary—fixing up a new house, the odd ebb and flow of my work (which thankfully recently turned up several notches), trying to manage both my aging father’s and my own lives etc., etc.

Now I’m not sure how many people actually noticed that the lifeinthetalllane.com blog faucet, running at full force since the middle of October, abruptly shut off just before the double holiday whammy. But dry up it did, and not for the absence of water running through it. Maybe more like for the lack of an appropriate faucet. “Oh yeah, aren’t you that guy that wrote a few blogs back in late 2017?” Gone without a trace?! In fact, as of this writing one and only one person has asked me when I was going to post again. Fortunately this person, though a recent acquaintance, holds quite a bit of weight because she is a former English teacher. (You know who you are—the fact that you asked means a lot. Thanks for reading!)

In my hiatus, which has, truth be told, dragged on much longer than I thought it would, I have learned several things:

—Since it seems I’m doing this for me (and maybe one other person) I will do it when I choose and when the time required to post doesn’t destroy something of higher priority in my fairly complicated life. The weekly post regimen was a good exercise in blog discipline, but I’m not going to stress if I can’t publish on my given deadline day. I now know for the most part nobody else will stress either, and that's fine. Seems like almost every day there’s some tidbit of a situation that happens to me that could inspire a new blog entry out of my self acknowledged ADD'd out mind. I note those and keep them for future reference whenever possible. That’s not the problem.

2019 Lamborghini URUS sport SUV.

--I’ve come to realize I’m somewhat torn as I go back and forth on what this thing should actually be: Is it a take on current affairs either in my life or more broadly? Maybe. Yeah I know I wrote about what I was thankful for around Thanksgiving—by the way, as of this writing the car is STILL not fixed...Or is it more of a mining exercise—digging the odd tidbits from the depths of my mind that someone hopefully might take an interest in. Realistically, probably a little of both.

Hard to believe that this vehicle falls into the same class as the trusty Suburban. Turtle indeed!

--Certainly the things that happen to me and that I think about form the fabric of this blog. I may eat my own words, but at this point I don’t plan to write directly about, for example, what Santa Claus might have brought me. (Unless he brings me something really cool like the Lamborghini SUV I recently saw at the Auto Show. The same Lamborghini that, when I texted a picture of to one of my daughters, then responded back that it looked like a turtle. That would be a zero to 60 mph in like 2.6 second turtle...)

Well...

So please bear with me as I fight for my sea legs in this (still new to me) attempted equilibrium of writing at least semi-regularly. I do find value and importance simply in the act of writing. The jotting down and writing of things that pop into my head is the easy part. That can and does happen any time, day or night thanks to the trusty iPhone, never far from my grasp. It’s putting it all into a presentable form so that someone other than me might actually make sense of it of all that holds me up. Although enjoyable and a great learning experience, it's a lot of work!  Please stay tuned. I hope that even as I write about seemingly nothing that these words might have some meaning and connection for at least someone out there.

Blog #8 On the subject of blog feedback. I need your help...

We live in strange times for sure...For example, just this week two once well respected pillars of modern media go down in one day due to sexual misconduct. Stunning and sad news to be sure, for all parties involved. With that in mind, I’m not going anywhere near it! I will continue down my reasonably light and airy path and attempt to create some sort of a diversion to all this madness. In this case, I’m going to be bold and ask for some assistance...

Photo by Biitli/iStock / Getty Images

Now that I have a few blog posts under my belt, when friends run into me in person the subject of me writing the blog often comes up. Now I hope you know, I actually try my best NOT to bring it up, because I have no clue what the rules of engagement are for something like this. For example, if you run into someone with whom you are Facebook friends, do you say something like, "Hey! Nice post yesterday...?” I know for sure I don't, feeling that there is some line crossed if you talk in conversation about your digital efforts at communicating. It’s like face to face, old fashioned conversations and communicating via social media are two totally different worlds. If asked and prompted, I will talk about the blog as much as anyone would like. But I am not one typically to blow my own horn, at least in verbal conversation. For some reason all bets seem to be off when it comes to me writing though. For me, the writing down of thoughts and (the possibility of) those thoughts being seen by someone else seems to cross some sort of boundary that I wouldn't cross in conversation.

The one question about the blog that seems to come up inevitably in some form during conversation is, "Who are you doing this for?" A legitimate question to be sure, and actually one that I have a tough time answering. The initial answer is, "Me", of course. I have already written about the therapeutic value of being able to convey my thoughts in some sort of written form. That has been a wonderful part of all this. There will be more to come on that subject. And yes, I know I write on the long winded side! But there is also the ‘meaning’ department. Of course what I write has meaning to me. But there is also a part of me that wonders if what I have to say has any value to anyone else. I guess my ideal goal in each blog entry is to try to convey some sort of message (albeit subtle sometimes) that makes one pause, maybe just for a short moment, to think about what I have presented. I have no idea if I am accomplishing that goal or not, quite honestly. I also get asked if I have a lot of 'followers', to which I always shrug. I don't know, and furthermore don't even know how you become a 'follower'. It's not like there's a little button that you click on that says 'Follow'...is there? Although there is considerable analytic data available from my website host, not one of its many sections of data details ‘number of followers’.

With the experience of posting something every Friday for a couple months under my belt, I can tell you it is a lot of work. Anyone that I've talked to with blog experience can attest to that. However, at this point it is still a labor of love. I have generated a good deal of so far unpublished material in one form or another, some complete entries and others just rough ideas, and do plan on doing this for some time to come. So I’m in this for the long haul, at least as my weird schedule permits. The work part comes in the notification, and I want to come up with an efficient way that notifies the people that would like to know about it, and doesn't bother the ones who aren't interested.

Please know I am flattered if you are interested, but also completely understand if you aren't. I can't quite figure out how to handle this, because I am on the inside looking out, and I don't know how I would react if I was reading something like this written by someone else. But I would ask you to bear with me and help me figure out a (better) way of notifying those that ARE interested.

So far I have used Facebook and LinkedIn as my two main methods of notification. I've recently realized the Facebook end of this may be flawed because of their dreaded 'algorithms'. (Thanks Alan Cohen, this is all your fault.)  In other words, if I've posted that there’s a new entry on FB to all my 400-plus friends, those algorithms decide to notify some fraction of that number, based on what you 'like' and click on often and who knows what else. I don't know if it is 100, 200, or maybe just 50 or less. But in my mind, everyone that I would at least like to know that I am writing is not finding out about it, at least regularly. I don't know if LinkedIn works the same way or not...But including all my LinkedIn contacts close to doubles the possible notifications.

My next method has been the 'other' social media platforms such as Instagram and Twitter. These have not been particularly useful so far, mainly because I started new work related (Northend Media LTD) accounts, and consequently have very few followers so far.  But I keep putting posts on, and following others as need be. I can be patient with regard to those.

The last, and most promising, method is what I call the ‘direct’ one. I have a text message group that currently tries to reach people I'm not FB friends with. I just send out a message saying there's a new post, and include a link. Pretty simple. I know there is a way to do this with email as well, but it require a few steps more than the text. But I could build a group email as well for notification if needed.

This is where I ask for your help. What should I do? Should I do anything? Or does it even matter?? After all, there are quite a few other things you could be doing with your time. If you would, please let me know in some way or another. You can comment on FB, LinkedIn, on the blog page itself, or via any of the ways to contact me listed in my 'About' page in the blog website. As a blogging newbie, I'm curious about all this, and at this point at least, know of no other way to figure what to do...

As always, I appreciate your time spent reading, and thanks for any input you may give. And please know, I'm just getting warmed up!!!