On this date in 2008, I signed into Blogger, wrote a very brief introductory post, and hit publish. I didn’t even know how to post a photo. But I figured it out shortly after that. And so, this little corner of the online-virtual-social media world began. I was tentative at first, wondering if anyone would find me out there in the early days of blogging. Blogging was quite new and there weren’t many of us yet. But if you followed another blog, that blogger would most likely return the favor, and slowly I built up an readership. The list of what I didn’t know was very long, but you know I like a challenge, so I researched and observed and added a header and tried my best to style my blog. It really reminded me of the Wild West. So many of us were trekking into this new world, trying to build our homesteads on the web.

In those days, enhancing the look of the blog was an ongoing challenge. I was always trying something new. We were pretty much stuck with Blogger’s basic layout. It wasn’t until I moved to WordPress (which was a big deal) that I was able to experiment with new layouts, new designs. I learned a  bit of coding. I really loved it. I did the entire changeover, moving all my posts from Blogger to WordPress all by myself and believe me, I had no idea if it would work! But it did.

The blog has had many different looks in these 16 years, but this current look has been around the longest. At some point, I was happy with it and the need to change it melted away. WordPress has changed a lot, too, with a new block editor function. I happily said NO to that and I stuck with the ‘classic editor.’

I experimented more than once with trying to make this blog a big money maker. Wouldn’t that have been nice? But I finally realized that I would have had to fashion this blog into something it wasn’t. I would have had to stick to one thing – for example, decorating – and promote it constantly, trying to get sponsorships, thinking about keywords, and stats, and all the things I didn’t want to think about. Mockingbird Hill Cottage is about me and my life here in the Hudson Valley. I write from the heart. All that would have been lost if I’d gone the way of the ‘big’ bloggers. In the end, it just wasn’t me.

My dashboard tells me I have written 5,047 posts. It’s actually a bit more than that – I lost a few in the change to WordPress. Most likely around 5,055 or so. I’ve had 182,408 comments, but 50,572 of those are my responses to comments, something I couldn’t do with Blogger in those days, but could when I changed over to WP.

For the vast majority of these blogging years, I have blogged every day. I decided to cut back a bit last year – from 7 days a week to 4 days a week.

Of course, the best part of all of this has been you. Believe it or not, there are some readers from the very first days of this blog that are still with me. But mostly, there are some that have moved on, for whatever reason, some who have passed away, some that are newer readers. Just like in real life. I used to read a lot more blogs than I do now. And many of the blogs I read daily have disappeared, or haven’t been updated in years. Many now use Instagram as another form of blogging. (Though it isn’t a blog in any way, shape, or form.)

ANYWAY. I’m grateful you’re here. I’m grateful for the friends I have made here. Thank you.

But, honestly, I’m feeling that it’s more of a chore these days. I’ve said so much over these past 16 years. Whatever I wanted you to know about our life here, you know. (Believe me, I don’t share everything). I’m not coaching as much anymore – I have a strong feeling that my days of coaching are coming to an end, given my age and the changes in theater and budgets. I hope that is not the case. Just writing those few words brought tears to my eyes. As you know, both Don and I need to and want to work and there’s not much, if any, of that happening now. We can’t afford to travel these days. Our lives are more contained and more routine. In some ways, we really like that. But it doesn’t make for scintillating blog content. How many times can I say: Don went grocery shopping. Made a pie. I cleaned the bathroom, watered the plants, etc.?

Nothing is for sure, but I think this might be my last year of blogging. It costs me money to maintain this blog and my ads help with that. Nevertheless, there are a lot of moving parts, not the least of which is security for the blog, that take a chunk of money yearly. And more than that, I’m losing my appetite for it. I often feel that I’ve said all I can say.

I go back and forth on this issue. I would deeply miss all of you. I might feel rudderless without this blog. So: I don’t know yet, but I’m giving you a heads up. I’ve never worked at any job in my life for 16 years –  just this blog. It might be time to start winding down. But I will stay with it through this year. Who knows? I may stay with it even longer than that. I’ll know more as the year progresses.

Thank you, my friends. Thanks for being here. It means more than you can ever know.

Stay safe.

Happy Saturday.