It's been one year today since I started posting in earnest, more or less regularly - I had the blog for some six months before that, but only posted once every month or two until June 26 of last year. Given that it's been a year, I want to take a moment to ramble about why I do this, and what's been holding me back in it. If you have no interest in maudlin ramblings, no worries, feel free to skip this one. I won't hold it against you. Grab yourself a WTF Brownie on your way out. ;-)
I realize I have been infrequent and inconsistent in my posting lately. It's not that I've been too busy, or that the world has provided me with insufficient quantities of WTFery - trust and believe that's NEVER a problem >.< - or anything like that. It's a combination of Teaspoon Exhaustion - where you're overwhelmed by the stunning volume of crap you're trying to shift, in comparison to the tininess of your teaspoon, and suddenly your teaspooning arm is too tired to raise and your teaspoon seems to have grown inexplicably heavy, so you're left staring at everything that is so wrong and feeling utterly helpless to go about making it right. Other people might call it activist burnout. - and a nagging worry that has plagued me on and off since I started blogging seriously one year ago.
Every so often, I look at this blog, and I wonder...why am I doing this? Is anyone listening? Does this help anyone, add any value to the world? I know I have followers, and even a few regular commenters - trust me, I know all your names (without looking at the Disqus record of posts, even), and you are a large part of what keeps me going at this; you have my eternal love and gratitude for being a voice back from the wide darkness of the Internet, my dears, letting me know I'm not just talking to an empty room - but there's this part of me that says, Yes, but. Yes, but there are so many other feminist blogs. Even a couple other pagan feminists. And queer feminists. And the main feminist blogs, they are so big! And so beautifully well done! How could you think to compete with the vibrant, gorgeous community of Shakesville? Yes, you have some readers, but shouldn't you just cede the field and let the dozens and hundreds of other voices, more experienced and older and wiser than you, take care of it? Yes, you have some readers, but what value do you really add to the conversation that other people don't already add, and better than you can?
And then I almost lost this blog, this Wednesday past. My Google account got hijacked somehow and used to send a malware link to my whole address book. Gmail's filters caught it before it could get out (so if you've ever emailed me, don't worry, it shouldn't have gotten to you...and if you haven't, why the hell not? ;-) ), and disabled my account. My main Google account, on which I keep documents, my Reader subscriptions, my email...and this blog. I was just sorta cranky about it, until I realized that this blog was part of the account that I could lose. It panicked me. I freaked the fuck out at the thought of losing it, having to start over...and then I realized something. It never crossed my mind, in those ten minutes of panic before I got my account reinstated, to just...let the blog go. If I really didn't think this meant anything, if I really didn't think this blog was valuable to anyone but myself...why was I so terrified at the prospect of losing it? Why did I not consider for so much as a single moment anything but starting over and going on, even if I couldn't get this blog back?
Apparently, I have more faith in this place and this work than I knew. And really, that was all the answer I needed. Maybe I add distinct value, uniquity, to the feminist blogosphere. Maybe I don't. Maybe people would notice if I never posted again, and maybe they wouldn't. But even if the only thing this accomplishes is the presence of one more profanity-laced voice raised against the kyriarchy...so be it. I will keep standing here, shouting curses and analyses at the oppressive power structures of our world for as long as they keep on existing and oppressing. If you want to be part of that, come in and be welcome. If not, no hard feelings.
So happy blogiversary to WitchWords and I. Here's to as many more as it takes.
