The first rule about blogging is . . . you don’t talk about blogging.
It’s a funny thing, this blog world. I’m pretty open about my life and what’s going on in it, but the one subject that is hard for me to broach is the fact that I am a blogger. It just – I don’t know. It feels weird. Like announcing your salary or something. I can talk about being a marriage and family therapist all day long, but for some reason admitting that I have been moving more and more into a role of blogging as a living? Awkward.
There are so many feelings wrapped up in that. Number one being the cringe I have felt as other bloggers talk about their “audience”. Number two being the fact that self-promotion, on a list of my life skills, would rank pretty low on the list. Right next to “making small talk with strangers” and “following directions without writing them down”. Self-promotion makes me itchy. I nearly died of shame the day I succumbed to the facebook fan page. But at the same time, I can admit that I really enjoy blogging, and it is providing me with a great way to supplement my income (from home) without diving back into doing counseling during this season. So, the dilemma, you see. Growing my blog is good for my family. But not good for my anxiety about self-promotion.
I am much more comfortable pretending to talk to an empty room. I would be more comfortable if that sidebar wasn’t cluttered with ads that generate based on the topic of the day. (And my formal apology for the gun ads for this post and the dating service ads I’m told were up yesterday). Sure, I get a little pang of resentment when I visit those blogs that boast an “AD-FREE” button, but I’m not really in that position.
(Okay, lemme just say. The self-righteousness over blog ads? It makes me want to create a button that says “nope, not privileged enough to indulge in a time-sucking hobby without justifying the time spent in some monetary value”. And really. Should my husband stop charging his psychotherapy patients? Should my friend who is an artist give her paintings away for free? Are they both sell-outs if they don’t?)
(And could that owl look more pretentious about it?)
Well. Now that I’ve gotten that off my chest.
Back to the subject I’m trying to avoid, now that I’ve hemmed and hawed for several paragraphs: I’ve been nominated for a Blogluxe award. A couple of them. (Thank you, whoever did that). Blogluxe is sort of like the Oscars of the blog world. They are given out in New York during the Blogher conference, which I’ll be attending. Making good use of my “self-promotion” and “making small-talk with strangers” skills, of course. A Blogluxe award would be a huge boost to my site traffic. Which would improve my income from writing. Which would give me more justification to keep up the blog, which would keep me sane, which would make me a better mom for my kids. BASICALLY WINNING THIS AWARD WILL SAVE MY FAMILY.
Okay, not really. But it would be cool.
Here’s the really awkward part. They have it set up so that people can vote every day until July 12th. Some nominees are posting status update reminders, tweeting, and blogging daily to get those votes. (See. Those Blogluxe people are good at the self-promotion). But yeah, that’s not really me. So, I’m just gonna ask one time – and leave up this big reminder on your left. When you check my blog and see it, would you click it and go vote? It takes just a second. You don’t have to log in. You leave your email, they shoot you a confirmation, and you click on it. That’s it. I will take it down on July 12th. But if you see it before then, would you vote?
I’m nominated in a couple categories. You don’t need to vote for me in each one (although you can). I should probably tell you which one. Maybe Guilty Pleasure? (Mostly because that category has the least amount of blogs nominated, therefore less competition). Or Funny? Sheesh. I don’t know. Follow your heart.
Okay. I’m gonna slink away now and pretend like this never happened.
