Four years ago today, I posted my first entry to Written Inc. Since then, I've evolved a somewhat quaint little tradition in that I write an anniversary post every June 26th (click for the first, second and third annivesary entries.) I'm not sure why: What, after all, can I say differently about the road I've taken that I didn't already say last year, or the year before?
But my obsessive nature compels me to mark personal milestones in some subtle way. In many ways, this little blog has been a gateway to so much more, a springboard to a writing career and a connection to a community I wouldn't have known if I hadn't taken that first step. It's been the fuel that rekindled my burning need to catalog the world around me with words and images.
More specifically, it's been a neat way to journal my life and the life of my family, to tell our ongoing story in ways that simply wouldn't have been as rich in any other medium. It turned me back into a storyteller.
Your turn: Why do you blog? How has it affected your life
One more thing: This week's Thematic Photographic theme is wood. Click here to get started if you haven't already done so. Bonus points for bringing a friend along!
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Be Still, Advent Day 19: Shine Your Light
12 hours ago
22 comments:
amusingly, today is my second blogiversary. we share the same day! :)
blogging has literally saved my life on more than one occasion. i don't know what i would do without it.
Congrats on four years! Your blog is amazing.
Four years?! Congratulations, Carmi, you bring joy and things of interest to each of us daily.
I have written often of blogging. Now doctors are beginning to see the benefits as well. There is an article in a recent Newsweek that I will post soon, telling how psychiatrists are recognizing the benefits of it and encouraging their patients to start a blog.
I started blogging as a way to keep in touch with everyone I left back in Phoenix. Then I started having fun with the "free-lance" nature of blogging, allowing me to hone my writing skills in my own style, and share photos and art work. Along the way I found wonderful friends from all over the world! I love the challenges and memes and sharing comments.
Happy Blogiversary -- 4 years! Wow. I have a two-year anniversary coming up at the end of the summer, and I really don't know what I did before I had this outlet. Why do I do it? To vent, to laugh, to share. And to make some darn good friends in the process.
Four years blows me away. You rule, Carmi.
Happy Blogiversary Carmi. Your blog is a joy to read. Always insightful and thought provoking. Most of the time I feel very connected to my blog, and the people I have met through it. Every now and then though it is a nagging spot in the back of my mind, when I can't quite figure what to post about. Know what I meann?
Happy Anniversary Carmi.
Thanks for your recent comment. I really appreciated what you said.
Happy anniversary, Carmi! I just renewed (well, paid for renewal, it's not due for another 2 weeks) my site. But I didn't write my first post 'til November, so I have a ways to go before my anniversary. I can only hope that in four years' time, I will have developed my blog into something half as great as yours. Keep up the great work!
-smarmoofus
Grats on 4 years :-)
Blogging's helped me out - it's let me talk through various issues I've gone through so I can get my thinking straight.
I think doing that has settled me down a bit, kinda like unravelling the chaotic thoughts and putting them into some kind of order.
Happy Blogiversary! Here's wishing you many more posts. Your site is a pleasure to read, and your pictures are delightful.
Congratulations on your Anniversary - or blogiversary as lara so nicely pointed out! Blogging is a great way for us all to open ourselves up and put our thoughts and feelings into words. Typing is just easier than writing - your hand cramps less!
In all seriousness, some of us just need a way to express certain things - from what's going on in our lifes - rants about what's going on in the world, or simply sharing something interesting, fun and exciting with your readers.
Your blog is amazing and I look forward to many more blogiversaries!
Cheers!
It's been a great four years. Here's to many more to come.
I used to blog to help drive traffic toward my production company site. Once the company went under, I blogged basically because it was something I was used to. Today I blog mostly for my kids, I'm trying to keep it as a wordy photo album for them.
Also, I enjoy the contact with others of a like mind. I probably have ten-fold the friends through blogs that I do in real life.
4 years!!! That is wonderful to mark with some notice. I can't tell you how fortunate I feel to have happened upon your blog. You and your blog are inspiring and great! Your family moments are touching and full of love. Just great...
I started to blog for a creative outlet (inspired by my brother's writing). Now I do it for so many other reasons... I have expanded ways that I am creative and have been in contact with some really wonderful people. It has turned into so much more than I could have imagined.
Here's to continued blogging and connecting! And I just have to add... here's to good in the world and spreading it around!
Congrats on your achievement.
As for me, blogging is a means of tormenting people with stuff my wife doesn't want to listen to.
:)
Cheers.
Congratulations! Four years... that's like 32 in Blog Years, isn't it?
Technically my blog will turn 2 in November, but a look at may archives will reveal that I haven't been remotely conscientious about keeping it current until lately. I started it as a way to meet chicks, then figured out that none of them were reading it (I'm kidding, okay?). Seriously, I used it as an occasional outlet when I felt the need to vent my spleen on (usually) the idiocy in Washington or when the Canes were doing particularly well (or poorly).
But I finally realized the power I had at my fingertips when I decided to finally quit smoking once and for all. And I was able to tap into a "support network" in the virtual community that I never imagined would be as helpful as they were -- and are. So the "real" birth of my blog really only dates back to the beginning of June.
And along the way I've encountered some incredible people writing incredible (and sometimes disturbing) things. I've come across the artistic, the hilarious, the folksy, and the downright weird(sometimes all in the same place).
I'm not sure I'd go as far as Lara did and say it literally saved my life, but it may have prolonged it (because of the smoking thing) and it's certainly enriched it.
And stopping by Written, Inc has been a big part of that enrichment. So thanks, congratulations, and here's to many more blogiversaries.
i started blogging in 2006 but took 2007 off because of health reasons... i wasn't going to come back but my husband wanted me to get my blog going again... i couldn't seem to get myself motivated.....
finally, i renewed my interest in taking photos and i wanted to share them with others... that was the catalyst that got me on the go... i have days when i think of letting it go, but then i push the thought out of my mind..
we live quite a distance from our sons so that is another reason i keep on keeping on.... :)
happy blogiversary carmi, i am so glad i found your blog.
Congratulations, Carmi. I am so glad too that I found your blog, through Melange, I'm sure.
I started my blog at my son's suggestion. He was blogging and thought that it might be a good outlet for me.
I have no profound thoughts that I write about, and when I read other peoples' blogs, I realize how gifted many are at writing, and I am not.
Anyway, I love the friends that I've made through this medium probably more than anything.
Carmi,
Congrats on four years. I don't know why I blog, I just know that I like it. I actually enjoy reading other people's blogs more than writing on mine. I also know that my hobby of reading blogs, commenting on them, and posting on my own blog - has not always been well received by my better half. Never-the-less, I continue, because I enjoy it. I particularly enjoy reading your blog, and looking at the beautiful pictures. Keep up your great work.
I've GOT to stop moderating comments on my mobile device. This week's been a bad one for accidentally nuking comments that shouldn't have been. Apologies go out to Killired for accidentally deleting it on my BlackBerry (if you saw how easy it is to slip the cursor from "Publish" to "Reject" with the little trackball thing, you'd understand my frustration.)
I guess I'll stop moderating when I'm away from my laptop. Again, my apologies. Here's her original comment:
congratulations on another year well done!
i can tell you why i no longer blog... but you already know!
i miss it tremendously! i was going to start blogging again until something happened... i sadly deleted my blog this week. i copy and pasted all the code into a word doc. though.
i hope you never have to delete your blog..it's awesome!
So many bloggers I know have posted a "Why?" answer the past week or two!
We seem to be connected in strange n wonderful ways-
Connectedness was the why I posted June 01 in
http://snaggedt.blogspot.com/2008/06/s-l-o-w.html
Ya, I agree, never delete, just begin another url-
Happy Blogiversary Carmi. I always enjoy the time I spend wandering through your realm.
I started my first blog to keep my family in the loop of what I was doing while I was living in India in 2003. I dropped out in 2004 - was still maintaining a Web site at that time - but picked it back up when I went to the Philippines at the end of 2005. After that, I stuck with it on a more regular basis. Mostly because I've had many requests from friends and family to continue blogging in order to let them know what was going on in our neck of the woods. Apparently - as far as distance and frequency of visits to friends and family are concerned - living in India or the Philippines isn't much different than living in Alberta if you started out as a Maritimer.
I’ll blog about anything, although of late I spend most of my time writing about reading, learning, education (readers are aware that I whine about it constantly), military, or travel. I don’t have a large readership and have learned that it's perfectly ok to be ranting and raving into a semi-empty corner of the blogosphere.
I try my best to blog every day, but don’t often succeed. Sometimes I let weeks slip past without an entry. Lately I seem to be skipping Thursdays.
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