what sandra thinks

I subscribe to my own blog. Is that weird? I get a weekly digest. It’s not an egotistical thing. It’s not like I re-read my posts when the weekly email arrives. Ooh! What did Sandra post this week?? No. Besides, by the time I’ve published something, I’ve already proofread it about twenty times. I’m sick of myself. I just like to see how others see my posts… and it gives me a picture of what I posted over the week.

Lately, I’ve felt very absent from here. I haven’t been writing/posting as much. Some of my ‘regulars‘ have disappeared. I assume the reasons are my lack of posts and my lack of time/energy to keep up with reading blogs. I have had less interaction lately. But I’d think fewer posts would allow readers to read more of what I do post… since it won’t take long.

But what the hell do I know? Maybe I’m just off-putting. Or maybe they’re too busy. But that reason flies out the window when I see the same people active on other blogs… just not mine. Do I smell? [Aside: Yes, I do. I smell good. Oddly, people tell me this all the time. Strangers, I mean.]

Got off track there for a minute…

My point is that although I feel like I’ve been kind of missing from this blogging world lately, I’m not as missing as I thought. I’ve posted four times in the last week. Sure, one was just a silly ‘joke‘ post, but I guess it still counts. I think I’m okay with this. Four times a week isn’t bad. Part of me thinks I’ll always be shooting for one post per day, but I can live with four a week. And I’ve started catching up with my post notifications. I just had to skip some of the oldest ones… or I’d never get to the current posts.

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Oh man, I write about nothing lately, though, huh? Well… maybe it will get better. I still have that compelling back pain update to write. [Sarcasm.] Oh… and I started writing a poem yesterday. A fucking poem! I know… it’s not a big deal. Except that it is… because I haven’t been able to write one for some time.

Maybe my brain isn’t completely incapacitated after all…

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©2018 what sandra thinks

Does posting a lot get you more followers or fewer? Does it make readers engage more or less?

[When I say ‘a lot’, I mean posting two or three or more times a day. Not ‘a lot’ would be two or three or maybe four times a week.]

I have wondered this for a long time. Probably since I started blogging. I don’t know that I’ll ever have the answer. Maybe there isn’t one.

For me, as a reader, I’m more likely to read/keep up with blogs from those who post once a day or less. [With the exception of mostly-photography/art blogs that I follow… I rarely miss any posts even if there are lots… because they are so beautiful. Ahem… you know who you are.]

For those who post multiple times a day, I try to read everything, but I sometimes find myself skipping that blog entirely because picking and choosing which posts to read or not read overwhelms me (especially if the posts are also long)… so I give up. I feel so bad about it, but I just can’t get to that many posts every day. And I rarely manage to get back to those posts later because they keep coming. I confess to unfollowing some blogs where there are too many posts. That hasn’t happened in a long time, but it has happened.

It’s also summer… so with the kids home, I’ve had lots of days when I haven’t been here at all. I’ve had days when I never even started up my laptop. That’s not like me. Or maybe now, that is like me. Things change. And I’m betting they’ll change again when school starts again in 3.5 weeks. Probably not for the better.

I don’t mean to say that bloggers shouldn’t post lots… as much as they want. Some are prolific writers. They have a lot to say. I might post a few times a day, too, if I was in that place. Maybe I’ve had periods when I did do that. I can’t remember. But now, I don’t think I’d do it. I think I’d be more likely to schedule posts ahead so that when I have a writing drought (like now), I’d still have things to share.

And that raises another matter. Recently, when I do have time, I’ve been trying to write because I’ve not been able to do so for a long time (and I hate it).

While my son is mostly self-entertained and self-contained (ha), my daughter wants my time… lots of it. And that’s been good for me. We’ve gotten closer than ever, and it has helped both of us avoid some inevitable boredom. And it’s forced me to listen to some music I never would have listened to by choice… but now I even like some of it. But that’s a topic for another post. A humiliating one, I’m sure.

But…

Lately, I am largely out of touch with this world. The blogging world, I mean. [Aside: I know there is a term for this world but it is one of those words I hate… and I refuse to use it.]

For the past month, I average two or three posts a week. That’s not a lot. I have seen a decrease in my stats, but only overall. Obviously, I have less traffic on days when I don’t post. But if I look at stats for individual posts, there is essentially no change. Maybe I’m not ‘losing people‘ like I feel like I am. In fact, since 7/1, I’ve had almost 150 new followers. [And I have no idea how they find me… or why they stay… or if they stay. I’m sure a bunch of these are empty follows. I’m sure there’s some trendy-ass term for that, too, but I don’t know it and probably wouldn’t use it anyway.]

But the ‘losing people‘ feeling I have isn’t about stats. It’s about engagement… and contact. Comments seem pretty steady… from some of my ‘regulars‘ and some new people, too. [Nice to meet you!] But I don’t hear from people much anymore. I mean, through emails and twitter DMs and things like that. I know people have busy, full lives… even I have been busy (yet in some ways still plagued by boredom). And sometimes people just don’t feel like talking. Or they have too much on their minds. I try to keep from thinking it’s my fault. Although, I admit, I do think that sometimes. That’s kind of self-centered, huh? But I get sick of me… others might, too.

As usual (lately, anyway), I don’t know what the point of this post is. Remember those assignments from grade school where you had to read something and identify the ‘main idea‘? I always hated those. Maybe that’s still a problem for me.

I guess I wonder… More is more? Or… Less is more? And I guess I feel like the party’s going on around me but I’m not in attendance… and if I pop in, I’m still on the outside. It feels kind of all-or-nothing, and in my case, leaning toward nothing.

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©2018 what sandra thinks