Thursday, June 7, 2012

Why My Blog Isn't What It Used to Be

Many of you are going to like the fact that this is a post. Many of you probably aren't going to like what it says.

Blogging hasn't been the same for the past few months. The joy is gone. I have to squeeze the words out. Where once I couldn't wait to get home and blog about whatever, now blogging fills me with a frustrating and painful dread. Where once every post sounded to me like music, now each is stilted, halting, and choppy.

I've barely even been keeping up on reading the blogs I follow because going to my dashboard, knowing I haven't posted in a while, makes me feel guilty and uneasy.

I want you, my reader and my friend, to have something worth reading. I don't want to keep giving you the meager fare I have offered as of late. You deserve a little more this and a little less this.

That's why I'm letting myself off the hook. I don't want to feel obligated to blog anymore. I'm taking a break before I begin to resent it. This is not a hiatus. This is a mental and emotional step back from something that shouldn't be contributing to the current stress and worry in my life but, unfortunately, is. If I feel like blogging, I will, but I'm not going to force it.

In doing this, I'm hoping not only to eventually restore my love of the art but also to save my blovel (blog-novel, portmanteau coined by Drew). I was inspired to start working on a book by something my friend Ashley said in praise of my blog. It's still in the pre-writing stages (characterization, plot outlines, that sort of thing), but when I do finally start writing, I want it to resemble the blog of last fall, the blog Ashley loved, not the blog of this spring.

I want to rediscover something I've lost.

Listening to: The Lizzie Bennet Diaries
Reading: Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins