...In Which Life Gets in the Way

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Five months into 2015 and it's official: I royally flunked.

I've been debating with myself if I should write this post and sound whiny, or grind my teeth and pretend everything was cool. My decision was made when I realised two weeks had passed since my latest post, which pretty much makes you dead in the blogging universe. Now, from Day 1, I've always refused to adhere to stupid rules and turn blogging into a chore. On the other hand, with my followers and readers base, it's not like I can go M.I.A. for weeks and expect to gain more of them, or to become an established blogger. So I decided I owed such followers and readers - not to mention new visitors - an explanation, at the very least.

My goal for this year was to produce an average of a post per week - which I did last year. And which should have been so simple to accomplish. Until it wasn't.

Back in 2014, I kick-started the year with the Book Blogger New Year's Challenge by Parajunkee. I suppose this helped, both on the morale and the post-quantity side. Anyway, 2014 was a quiet but steady year for me - so I thought it would be easy to keep up with the flow in 2015. Um...apparently, not.

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You see, there's this annoying little thing called life, that has a penchant for getting in the way. I'm not going into my personal problems here, but suffice to say, in my life there's not always enough time to devote to blogging - and even more, not enough energy to convey into it. Let's face it - it's much more challenging for an adult blogger. And no, I'm not saying that my younger pals have it easy. But it's a fact - family AND chores AND work are a much heavier bundle than school. Not to mention that, when you're zeroing in on 50 (or, well, 49 for now, but all the same), you often simply don't have the energy to keep up with all the stuff life throws your way, and blogging becomes another exhausting task sometimes. Plus, like I said - time. Heck, I like gifs as much as the next person, and I can see why they're needed - but the mere task of finding the right ones for my upcoming post may take hours sometimes...and this is a luxury I can't afford. Not often, anyway.

I love blogging. I sure as hell don't want to quit. I want this small blog to grow. And it's depressing when you look around and realise that so many people who started around the same time as you have hundreds of followers, while you're stuck at 88. So you feel restless and want to do something, but also feel like everyone's out of your league, and shouldn't you put what remains of your mauled energy into cleaning house and stuff? Which is not my idea of living life, though it's required from us adults. Only, you see, I want to keep this little corner of the net for myself. I want it to grow bigger. And it feels like climbing a mountain most of the time, and I'm aware I won't ever be able to reach the top - and for "top" I don't even mean becoming a Number 1 Blogger...

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I'm really tired right now. Physically and mentally. And I'm not making excuses or trying to invoke sympathy - I'm just stating a fact. And another fact is, I don't want to quit blogging. Because it keeps me sane. Because, as small as my audience may be, this is my outlet, and I would miss it if I quitted. Because I like to connect with my fellow bloggers. Because there are authors that I can help get the word out about their books. And I realised this involves work. So I'll have to do what it takes, juggle blogging with life - only not too hard. I was thinking I could try the meme thing again, but stick with the less demanding and more rewarding (content-wise) ones. It's either this or shutting up shop. Which I DON'T want to do.

I suppose some of you, at least, have felt this way, once in a while. I'm officially taking advice ;). Either way, you won't get rid of me so easily! *evil laugh* Till next time...thanks for listening!

[Made a while ago with a generator I can't remember...]