A Milestone

10^th April 2010 was when my first post was published. ‘Conversations’ has turned 2 today & this is my 100^th post! Happy? You bet! I’m glad I gave blogging a shot. But I also couldn’t help worrying, “It took me 24 months to write just 100 posts!! Why couldn't I write more?”

This milestone is a big deal for me as I’m not a gifted or a ‘natural’ writer. I take so much time to write a single post, barely managing to write 4 posts in 30 days! I know many who can literally type their mind out on a weekly, daily, & hourly basis. I can’t. Even if I did, I don’t think there is a post yet that I’ve published just right off the head. I keep chewing on it, pondering over it endlessly. Then, once I’m done typing out all the thoughts, I sit & bring down the 2 pages of that initial draft to just a page. To chop off sentences from your article is not easy. We tend to cling to them. As K.R Narayanan said, ‘it takes a lot of heartlessness to “murder your darlings.” I’m beginning to think I’m a very good murderer - an average writer with above average editing skills.

Blogging has been the precious pair of attentive ears that I’ve always wanted. Other than what it has done to my mind, I think the great thing about it is the people I "met." I’m lucky (touchwood!) that most of my readers are really nice & decent. I’ve heard of the creepy-crawlies that plague the blogs of women & considering that I write a lot of personal stuff, it’s a relief not to be hounded by such seedy characters.

I owe my wonderful readership to Indiblogger which I joined in July’11 & until which time I only had 2 readers - Suzaan & Suraj!! Then Prashanth came to & through him came Sahana who was the one who got me to join Indi. Thank you Prashanth for discovering my blog. Thank you Sahana for being my blog angel, & for guiding me on many aspects of blogging. Thank you Hemant & Murali for your valuable critique of my blog on Indi. It was Hemant’s feedback that made me think hard on having a blog name & switch from ‘Sujatha Sathya’ (ya…eeks!!) to ‘Conversations’! It was a time when I didn’t even know that there was a thing called blog name! Yup, I was pretty dumb!

What I learnt in the 2 years of blogging:

One must appreciate a reader’s time & effort when he reads/responds to a post. I don’t understand those that say, “More people should read me. I’m good” & accuse readers of being on this give & take system of reading a blog. I ask: why not? You want me to read you & you won’t read me?!!? Why boss? You think you are Shakespeare?

If you want to show your appreciation of my writing, don’t tell me I’m a good writer. I won’t believe you anyways! Just read me. This applies to ANY blogger. You like him, read him. Simple! Those that I like or built a rapport with, I’ve even gone backwards & read their older, initial posts. There are blogs that I’ve read COMPLETELY! That’s my way of saying: ‘I like that you make the time to read me regularly. Thank you would be too small a word to express myself. I read you because you write well, I connect to it, keep writing’.

For a long time (3 full months!), I obsessed about the number of followers/comments/page-views/statistics/ranks etc And then one day, realized I was running in the opposite direction. The disappointment over my own obsession with the number thing was so much that I became detached from it. Pretty early I must say. And eventually it stopped mattering so much. I learnt to distinguish a real reader from a passer-by & that the reason to blog cannot be the numbers game.