Did I hit a Nerve?

I have been writing this blog for over 14 years. I have never accepted any paid advertising, or sponsors. So I answer to no one. I make no money on it despite offers and I don’t plan on ever doing that. I don’t write to make money for myself. I did start it to raise money for the food bank in the beginning and it did that. But that impetus for starting is not my reason for sticking to it all these years.

At this point, this blog is my memory. I do it purely for myself and if my readers get any joy out of it, hooray. The topics I write about vary and there is no rhyme or reason what I am going to write about on any given day.

Sometimes it is something funny that happened that day, sometimes it is a recipe I just made up and will certainly forget if I don’t write it down. Sometime it is a thank you to someone who has been kind. Sometime it is a rant about something going on in the world or just with me. Sometimes it is a celebration.

Because of this blog I hear from my friends and family daily and it prompts lots of great conversations. It also means that when I see a friend in real life we can skip talking about me and we can talk all about them since, if they read this, they know what I have been doing. The only caveat is when I want to spill the tea that I purposefully did not blog about. Trust me, there are lots of things I don’t blog about, that would make a much more juicy blog, but for the sake of humanity I don’t put those things out in the universe.

I do have lots of readers who I have never met. I know this because I get analytics showing me where readers are located. A couple of days last week someone in Hong Kong read 176 different posts in two days. I am certain I don’t know that person. Or the readers from India, Indonesia, Chile, Serbia or Austria who read yesterday. I always pray that they have a good sense of humor and understand when I am being sarcastic.

Sometimes I write things that people don’t like. No problem. I am not writing for you to like me, but I am writing to say things I think should be said out loud and I am not afraid to say them.

I am not writing things to indoctrinate anyone and I invite discussion. Rarely do people who disagree with me write back anything thoughtful. If they disagree they might write me an insult, but since they don’t actually know me, the insults rarely land.

All I can say to the haters is, I am sorry if the mirror I held up made you dislike what you saw. If you would like to write a more thoughtful rebuttal, please do. Otherwise, don’t bother reading me. I am just going to make you mad, and without getting to actually know me your insults will have no effect on me.

To my kindred spirits, thank you for your kind comments. I do appreciate when I hear from you. Your kindnesses are noticed. And as always, I apologize for all the misspellings and grammatical mistakes that I publish daily. Since my practice is write for twenty minutes or less and get it out I KNOW there are lots of mistakes. Again, I don’t care, as long as it is not a mistake that hurts someone. My intention is never to hurt anyone personally, well with one exception.