Processing My Blog Explosion

I don’t know if you noticed… I didn’t immediately “deal” with the fact that my blog has suddenly gained a bigger audience.  I knew it was coming.  I received the e-mail telling me I would be featured on Freshly Pressed a few days before it actually happened, and since this is Round Two for me (um… what?!), I had a pretty good idea of what to expect.  Lots of Likes.  Lots of comments.  I’d begin with all the good intentions of replying to all of them, and then I’d give up and just start hitting “approve.”  Lots of new followers.  Lots of people clicking around my blog, liking and commenting on other posts, too.  And that’s exactly what happened.

Knowing it was coming didn’t mean that I was ready for it.  I watched it all unfold in front of me, but like last time, I kept myself a little detached.  Last time I had a very good reason for my detachment.  This time?  This time I think I was just intimidated by the idea of engaging in all the attention, discussion, and general blogging explosion.  I’m still coming to grips with the idea that my blog now has an audience.  Not just a few random people here and there, but a steady stream of visitors, complete strangers who are invested in hearing what I have to say.  In the past two weeks my blog has gained almost 400 more followers (hello to all of you!).  I knew it was coming.  My mind is still blown.

Thank you.

Thank you for all the kind, sincere comments.  Thank you for the interest you’ve taken in me.  I hope I can live up to the hype, but I don’t feel like I can.  That’s why I didn’t deal with it right away.  That’s why my first post after being Freshly Pressed was about teaching and didn’t address my current rush in popularity at all.  I don’t really know how to blog in the spotlight.

I’m just a teacher.  That’s it.  I teach English 10’s and monitor some study halls.  No master’s degree.  No great achievements to my name.  I’m a high school English teacher who likes to blog in her spare time.  Please don’t expect more than that from me.

OK, yeah, I’ve had some unique experiences.  I’ve traveled a lot, seen a lot of these great United States.  I’ve built some dreams for myself in the process and have been pretty vocal about those dreams here in the blogosphere.  Apparently people have connected to my experiences and my dreams, and so they’re interested in what I have to say.  Again, thank you.

It’s funny.  People in my life know about my blog, but I don’t really talk about it with anyone.  My friends and family read it. Sometimes they share my articles on Facebook when I don’t.  I don’t think any of my students or coworkers have discovered my blog yet, but it’s probably just a matter of time.  I’ve never tried to keep it a secret, but I also shy away from having actual conversations about it.  I don’t think I even verbally told anyone that I’d been Freshly Pressed again.  I find it weird to speak out loud about the things that I write.  I don’t know why.  I just do.

Maybe it’s because this blog only shows one side of who I am?  Because it’s intentionally an incomplete picture?  When I’m writing in my blog, I generally stay in the world of my professional career; I don’t delve into my personal life here.  I’ve mentioned my marriage and my husband in general terms, but for the most part, that piece of my life stays off the internet.  I’ve talked some about my family in regards to how it impacted my adolescence, but once again, I always tie it back to my professional experience and keep the most personal details out of the public eye.  

As much as I love my career, there’s a lot more to me and who I am.  And just like the fact that there are pieces of my life that you, my blogging audience, cannot see or live with me, the reverse is also true.  My friends and family see much more of my personal life than my professional life.  They know the teaching stories I bring home, but they aren’t here with me, living it and seeing it with their own eyes.  They don’t think of me as Mrs. Roberson, the teacher.  They know me as Christine, the wife, daughter, sibling, and friend.  For some reason I find it a bit disconcerting when my professional and personal worlds cross, so I don’t really talk about my blog.

I write the things that I find weird to say out loud.  I write the ideas that need a voice beyond my personal world.  My view of this blog has changed in the months I’ve been writing.  I started by sounding my barbaric yawp out into the world, wondering if anyone would listen.  Now I carry the weight of the knowledge that people are listening.

I’m still processing that, but thank you for listening.