I’ll love you more if you blog.

February 8, 2012 Deborah the Closet Monster 52 comments

(Listen to this entry here)

***posted with my sister’s laughter & consent!***

Dear sister,

OK, so the title’s a lie. You know I love you times infinity.

Still, as your big sister, I feel compelled to share with you some actual benefits of blogging as an author. This is because:

(1)    You are about to finish writing your first novel, handily meeting the “author” requirement,

(2)    I still know better than you* and can’t let you forget it, and

(3)    I am just that helpful.

The list that follows is by no means comprehensive, but that’s only because there’s not enough time to share all my expertise. Also, my fingers would get really tired from typing that much.

In descending order of importance, these are the reasons you should start your very own blog:

(1)    Because I said so.

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Don't make the unicorns cry. Photo by Mackenzie Kincaid

(2)    Chipmunks told my friend Julie that the unicorns will cry if you don’t start a blog.

(3)    Your words consistently move me; blogging will enable those words to reach the hearts of many others. You’ll do some of this by your book**, but blogging will allow you to express different facets of yourself.

(4)    Many people like to know about the author in whom they’re investing, not just the book. For indie authors like me, a blog is an essential marketing tool, but even if you opt to publish traditionally, there’s only so much marketing a publishing company can do. By supplementing someone else’s presentation of you with your own expression of yourself, you’re creating a package that will be irrepressible. Kinda like my love for you.

(5)    Even as an author, blogging isn’t just a “marketing tool.” It’s also a research tool***! Unlike writing a book, where a lot of your feedback will come via reviews not intended for author input on third party sites, you can see quickly  what does and doesn’t work for readers. You learn really quickly what wasn’t as clear as you thought it was, as well as what really strikes people. It isn’t always what you expect, especially at the beginning. Best of all, you can talk to people. You can ask them questions about where and why they had questions, and use their answers to write more clearly in the future.

(6)    Best of all, blogging builds community. Sure, you learn a lot about people as readers, but you also learn about them as themselves. So much more of the world is illuminated through learning about these people, who become friends regardless of the fact you’ll never meet many of them face to face. If you’re like me, as you only naturally aspire to be, you’ll find you derive strength and joy from the connections you build by blogging, and you’ll find support that’s as invaluable when  you’re trying to establish your voice as it is freely granted.

(7)    You don’t actually have to write depressing stuff. I just like to do that. Julie, for example, writes a lot about chipmunks. Thoughtsy prefers to write about Pop Tarts and frozen yogurt.  Renee writes news much better (and funnier, which is really the important part) than news people do. Peg is indignant about many things and likes to express her indignation coupled with funny photo edits. My point here is that you can do what works for you and you’ll find lots of people will be drawn to that.****

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Be forewarned: Chucky has friends. Photo by me

(8)    I’ll give you some really heinous noogies if you don’t. Also, remember how I used to lock you and our other sibs in the basement and say Chucky was gonna get y’all? Chucky and I are tight now. You don’t have a basement, but I’m pretty sure I can get him to move into your garage.

(9)    Because I said so. This is actually the most important, as reflected by its also being #1 on this list, but I want to make sure this is the point that really sticks in your brain. Also because the 1,000 miles between us make it hard for me to say it as often as I did when we were kids.

So here’s the thing, Silver Star. Only you know what will or will not work for you. What I know is that I want more people to know you and love you the way I do, as an author and as a person. Most people will never see you exactly as I still do—the elven girl whose faith in and support of me from the time we were very small was, is and will ever remain a huge part of my strength—but I know that whatever pieces you do decide to share will shine in ways both illuminating and magnetic.

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Silver Star & Dark Moon 4eva

Your words reflect your heart, and your heart will draw people to you. Take me, for example. I remain captivated by your goodness even 31.9 years after first meeting you*****. Imagine what kind of response you’ll get from people only just meeting you for the first time!

Better still, don’t leave it to your imagination. Do it. Please?

Love,

Your extremely proud & lucky big sister

P.S. I mean it about those noogies. And Chucky.

* At least 7% of the time

** About which, can I pleeeeeeease read it already?

*** Shhh, don’t tell TMiYC’s readers I started the blog with impure motives!

**** Unless what works for you is sharing audio clips of songs your older sister wrote and sang for you. That’s forbidden under blogging law. Just ask the chipmunks.

***** Also 31.7 years after deciding I really did like you after all.

© 2012 Deborah Bryan. All rights reserved.
Duplication in whole or substantial portion is explicitly forbidden.

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    Categories: Blogging, Books, Family, Humor, Publishing, Writing Tags: advice, blogging is awesome, humor, life, love, sisters

    What slap bracelets, forgiveness and stick figures have in common

    February 7, 2012 Deborah the Closet Monster 26 comments

    Q: What would you get if Ella Fiztgerald and Darth Vader married?

    A: An Ella Vader!

    I might have graduated elementary school twenty years ago, but I laugh at that joke like I’m still eight. Every time.

    That joke isn’t the only thing “filling my cup” this morning. Not by a long shot! These are some of the other things conspiring to make my heart believe it’s Friday, not Tuesday:

    • This morning’s post by Julie at GoGuiltyPleasures. She wrote an amazing FTIAT entry here a couple months back, but I think her intro of me is her most riveting piece of writing yet. This lady knows awesome. (Tongue in cheek, folks! Tongue in cheek!) Also, she shows off Li’l D flexing for the camera in his new slap GoGuiltyPleasures bracelet. (Actually, Li’l D decided all three were his. I had to sneak one off to ensure I’d still have one in light of the adventures he puts his toys through.) You can’t tell from the picture, but he was actually, truly posing for the camera. Witnessing this while taking three dozen photos or so, Ba.D. and I agreed we might have taken about a thousand too many pictures of the kid over the course of his 28 months. We agreed this over giggles, naturally.
    • Last night’s post by Victoria at The Loneliness of the Stay-at-Home Mother. This moving post responds to a book that recently became my favorite. Read with tissues at hand!
    • Rereading Mynewfavoriteday‘s October interview with me. I forgot just how much of my soul is captured in that one short interview: ”Forgiveness makes the world better. Forgive others. And definitely, absolutely forgive yourself, knowing you can and will do better next time. You’ll be happier for this, and that happiness will flow into everything you do.”
    • Forgiveness. See above.
    • The many amazing blogs posted in comment to my last post. Please  read, comment on others’ posts and share one of your own if you haven’t already!
    • My last stick figure drawing, which explains yet another reason I don’t get to “see” a lot of new movies these days:
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    Watching movies with Li'l D

    What’s filling your cup this morning?

    © 2012 Deborah Bryan. All rights reserved.
    Duplication in whole or substantial portion is explicitly forbidden.

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    Categories: Blogging, Nerd, Personal, Reflections Tags: blog buddies, happy days, life, reading, stick figure drawings, thanks, yes i am a bald stick figure

    A bit about you

    February 5, 2012 Deborah the Closet Monster 38 comments

    On Thursday, I posed the following question for my blogger friends on Facebook:

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    I received some amazing links in response, but I haven’t had a chance to read all of them yet. This is in part due to time constraints, and in larger part due to attention span constraints. The instant I type that “f” leading me to Facebook, my attention span allotment is quartered. Then it’s quartered again, with the bulk of it taking a nap until I navigate away from Facebook.

    Because I asked the question Thursday, I was thinking in terms of “favorites” on Friday evening when I set to recording podcasts. Which would I record: my top hitters? My favorites? If “favorites,” how on earth would I choose such a thing? Was it really the one I’d hastily pasted in comment to my own post on Thursday?

    Although I posted three podcasts in yesterday’s entry, I actually recorded five entries on Friday. Reading them aloud allowed me to see with startling clarity that I do have a favorite. It is not, in fact, the one I’d provided the day before.

    It’s something else. But rather than waxing prolific, as I’m wont to do, I want to pose you a question, and answer as I’m asking you to.

    In comment, I’d love for you to share your own favorite entry for me and other TMiYC readers. Please do so using this format:

    • Blog name & link
    • Description of your blog in three words or fewer
    • Tell us where else you can be found on the web–Twitter, Facebook, etc. (as desired)
    • Give the title of your favorite blog entry & the link to it
    • In one sentence (of fewer than 100 words!), explain why it’s your favorite entry
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    Moments to embrace. Photo by Maggie Shikiya

    I have mad love for you guys. I get giddy when I see you sharing mad love for each other. I’ve got my fingers crossed that you’ll answer this question here, where conversation moves a little slower than on Facebook, and illuminate for me–through your choice–a little more about you.

    • The Monster in Your Closet
    • Sentimental, silly, searching
    • Twitter (@deb_bryan). Facebook (“yourclosetmonster”)
    • “An abridged history of my hate”: text & podcast
    • This post is me encapsulated: my hard and hateful history slowly, with loving consideration, become a smaller and smaller part of my overall history to where love is far and away the greater part of me

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    Categories: Blogging, Family, Friends, Podcast, Reflections, Youth Tags: audio, blogging, blogs, favorites, life, podcasts, questions

    Senses & (the) sensibility (of those A/V guys)

    February 4, 2012 Deborah the Closet Monster 29 comments

    The first time someone told me they followed my blog even though it’s in the “wrong” format, I scoffed.*

    At that point, I hadn’t watched a single vlog. I flipped the radio station when DJs started talking, because I wasn’t interested in their chit-chat.

    When someone else said they followed my blog despite its format a few months later, I repeated my earlier dismissal. I did this even though I’d not only watched a few vlogs but also created one of my own. I’d even started listening to—and enjoying!—radio chatter.

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    Made of win? See: showing up to my own high school graduation in shorts and hiking boots.

    Still, those A/V folks were wrong. I felt uniquely positioned to determine this based on the fact my every decision in life has been made of win. Every single one.

    When my friend Chris asked me if I’d give feedback on a podcast version of his wildly successful “Blissfully Bald” post, I was enthusiastic about the prospect. This wasn’t because I’d come to my senses about the spoken word, but because Chris has earned and affirmed my trust dozens of times over the year I’ve known him. If it was coming from him, it was going to be good. Period.

    I expected better than good. Truly. What I didn’t expect was the shock of hearing Chris’s moving words absent a muffling layer of my own voice atop them.

    Within twenty seconds, I was reaching for my Kleenex.

    Within a minute, I was using them.

    The written word will always be dear to me, but hearing Chris’s voice—not my own representation of it—drove each word straight through my heart. It reminded me the written word is not all there is in this world of many senses.

    I said as much to Chris, and asked if he’d mind my testing out a podcast or two of my own. With what I imagine was a laugh, he replied that he didn’t exactly invent the podcast.

    Following his lead, I’ve created podcasts of my three most popular posts. Click one or some of the links below to listen**:

    • My bully pulpit (text)
    • Gay love. Or, as I like to call it, love. (text)
    • Six hands for lifting: on my mom, mental illness, fear & hope (text)

    In addition to linking these posts here, I’ve added links to these audio files atop each of the posts.

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    This post made possible with the headphone-procurement assistance of Li'l D

    But this post isn’t just about what I’ve done.  It’s also about what and how you think. Do you prefer to read, listen or watch? Do you listen to audio books? Did you listen to these posts? Are there any other TMiYC posts you’d enjoy hearing? Most of all, do you have enough sense to try something before deciding you don’t like it?

    If “yes” to the latter, I applaud you, and hope to be a little more like you in the future!

    * This is my polite way of saying, “I wondered what they were smoking.” Everyone knows the written word is superior to everything. Including unicorns.

    ** If “some,” I’d recommend listening sequentially, not simultaneously.

    © 2012 Deborah Bryan. All rights reserved.
    Duplication in whole or substantial portion is explicitly forbidden.

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    Categories: Personal, Social media Tags: audio, from the bungalow, life, podcasts, unicorns, vlog

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