Tag: blog

SoCS: Top of JC’s Mind

…because, seriously, when the prompt is “mind”, how could I not?

I started Top of JC’s Mind almost two years ago because several people told me that I should start a blog. I had originally planned to call it Top of My Mind, but that was already taken, so I put my initials in the title instead.

I know that I couldn’t contain myself to a single topic, so I set out to write about whatever is on the top of my mind, but that isn’t quite true.

You see, the top of my mind is a pretty crowded space. If I wrote about everything that was on the top of my mind in any given day, I wouldn’t have time to do anything else.

So, I write only a bit of what is at the top of my mind – and those bits have been distributed differently than I originally envisioned.

I had thought that I would write a lot about fracking – or anti-fracking, really – because I spent many moons writing commentary on it as part of the anti-fracking grassroots in New York State. And there is some writing in that vein, along with climate change and other environmental themes, but, with the (mostly) ban in place, that has slowed down, perhaps much to the relief of readers, as well as fracktivists.

I also thought that I would post more poetry than I do. The reason is that I am trying to publish in literary journals, nearly all of whom will only consider work that is not previously published. And, for the most part, that means that if they can google it, they won’t accept it, even if it is only out on my little blog with a dozen views. Consequently, I don’t put too many of my poems here unless they have appeared elsewhere first. Generally, the rights revert back to me after publication.

I have written more about family and personal experiences than I intended, largely due to circumstances. A year ago, our elders, Nana, Paco, and Grandma, all ran into health challenges and the top, middle, and bottom of my mind were all pretty much filled up with care-taking and concern. Then, there are the more fun family things to post, like spending five weeks in Hawai’i with my daughter E.

I do want to get back to posting more about topics, such as feminism, politics, and religion/ethics. The life of the mind is important to me. I just wish there was a more direct and faster way to get my thoughts onto the (computer) page.

Although that would be overwhelming.

No one needs that much Top of JC’s Mind.

Except for me, of course, for whom there is no escape…
*****
This post is part of Linda’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday.  This week’s prompt is “mind.” Join us!  Find out how here:  http://lindaghill.com/2015/08/21/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-august-2215/

SoCS badge 2015

new follower record

Thanks to the combination of my SoCS post and my 500(ish) follower post, which was re-blogged by OM of HarsH ReaLiTy, I set a new record for followers on August 16: eight, breaking my old record of seven.

Thanks, everyone! Now I am up to 510!

500(ish) followers!

The most popular topic among bloggers is blogging! I admit that, while I read a lot of posts on blogging, I don’t often write one, but today I will because I have reached 500 followers for Top of JC’s Mind!

Or at least, 500ish. The numbers are a bit squishy. The number following through WordPress is 389 with email, Facebook, and twitter followers pushing the number up to 500. That means that some people who follow me on more than one platform are double or triple counted, but….

Let’s just say 500! Yay!

I want to take this opportunity to thank all my followers, especially those who visit regularly. There are even a few who comment regularly; thank you for keeping me from feeling as though I am talking to myself.

I also want to thank all the blogs I follow – all 750 of them. Some I get daily or weekly digest emails and visit frequently; others I don’t get to very often. You have all helped me to learn about blogging and gifted me with beauty, humor, poetry, stories, travelogues, photos, thought, and heart.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart and the Top of JC’s Mind,
Joanne

How many read your blog today?

I think that everyone should read Tric’s blog! You can tell her I sent you. 😉

tric's avatarMy thoughts on a page.

I was toying between that title or perhaps,  ‘How not to increase traffic to your blog’. I’ve been blogging over two years and for the most part have enjoyed every day of it. However in the last month, due to life, holidays, my children annoying me and my husband expecting me to feed him, I’ve had less time to write, to read and to post here on wordpress. This has naturally meant my usually high stats, (not!) have nose dived, leading me to wonder, and wondering is not always a good thing!

For as I wondered I grew envious (and bitter). Why do I not have a following of thousands reading my blog? Am I not interesting? At times funny? At times inspirational? Ok perhaps not.

This week I read a couple of posts from bloggers who had big stats. They were kindly telling me, and everyone else, but I…

View original post 648 more words

curious stats

I am not a big stats watcher, but I just happened to be looking up something and noticed that today I have one view but seven likes on my One-Liner Wednesday post. I realize it is because some people get my blog posts by email and can like a post through their email without visiting my blog. It is a good reminder, though, that some posts that don’t seem to be getting views may be read more widely than the stats show.

Julie, Julia, and blogging

My first big exposure to personal blogging was the film Julie & Julia.  I knew that blogging existed in some vague way before I saw the movie, but hadn’t read many blogs or heard much about blogs that were written by individual folks.

I have to say that I was not impressed.

Julie, the blogger in the movie, becomes so obsessed with her blog about making all of the recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking in a year that she becomes whiny, petulant, and inattentive to her job, her friends, and her spouse. She gains media attention, notoriety, and a book deal, but the costs to everyone around her are high.

On the other hand, I loved the intertwined story of Julia Child in France.  Her question of “What should I do?” and her quest to figure out what that was and to pursue it with passion, persistence, and good humor, all the while staying connected to her spouse and her friends, resonated with me.

My greater affinity with Julia has a lot to do with some similarities.  Julia McWilliams Child was a proud member of the Smith College class of 1934. I am class of 1982.  That women’s college/liberal arts background was evident to me in her ability to tackle new challenges and discern her way forward, especially as an outsider at the very French and very male Le Cordon Bleu, later as part of a circle of women chef-teachers, and finally her decades of teaching people to enjoy cooking and sharing food through her television shows and cookbooks.

I also related to Julia’s age in the film. She was about 49 when Mastering the Art of French Cooking was published, which was my age when I saw Julie & Julia.  I could appreciate the re-invention(s) that women make in their middle years and the ability to keep learning and growing that makes re-invention possible.

Maybe, if Julia’s story were unfolding in the 21st century, there would be a fabulous blog or website to accompany her book and television endeavors.

Maybe not.

Still, despite my initial bad impression of blogging, here I sit, writing a blog post about it.

Julie taught me things that I didn’t want my blog to be:  limited to a narrow topic, time-constrained, high-pressure, all-consuming.

Julia taught me to stay open to change, to accept criticism but to maintain the integrity of my work, to remember to enjoy time with family and friends (and food), to persevere even when it looks like the goal is unattainable.

So, I find myself five years after the film with a blog that is almost a year old that is eclectic and (I hope seen as) thoughtful, that has started to attract a small group of readers and commenters who appreciate some of the topics I write about and the way in which I write about them.  I have also in these years rediscovered poetry and am working to improve my poems and find appropriate journals or publishers with a goal of being published in print.

Unlike Julie and Julia, I am unlikely to ever publish a full-length book. I may eventually be able to publish a chapbook of poetry, but it won’t be as a result of my blog – or my cooking.

And I won’t give up from the discouraging number of rejection notices.

Julia didn’t.

 

 

Discovering my “Great posts worth seeing”

I often use the “Great posts worth seeing” list when other bloggers like or comment on my posts as a way to connect and find out what their blogs are about.  I had wondered what showed up on my list and now – at least for today – I know.

For the record, I did go back to HarsH ReaLiTy and manage to remove the “like” from my own comment. I’ll leave that to other people. 😉

How to suddenly increase followers

I’m having one of my try-to-learn-to-be-a-better-blogger afternoons. I actually managed to get my publicize links connected.

Next, I was doing some work on my widgets and realized that it suddenly said I had 169 followers, when I thought I had 113. Then, I realized that my follower number now included my (tiny) twitter following and my (slightly less tiny) Top of JC”s Mind facebook page followers. I think my small non-Wordpress email followers don’t get included in counts at all, other than in my heart, where I love you all!

I guess if I really want my number to jump, I can connect my personal Facebook page instead of my public page. I have about six times more FB friends than I do followers for my page. LOL

I did decide to finally list the number of followers in my sidebar. I had hesitated to do so because I was afraid that people would not want to follow or comment on a blog they knew was so tiny. If I notice a drop-off in traffic, I can always hide it again!

Just in case anyone wants to expand their ways of following me, the WordPress follow button is near the top of the sidebar to the right. The email follow widget is just below.

My Facebook Page for Top of JC’s Mind is here: https://www.facebook.com/topofjcsmind. I invite you to like my page if you are on Facebook.

I admit that I find twitter a challenge. I have difficulty containing myself to 140 characters! Those who love to follow on twitter can follow me, though. I’m @btmum.

Maybe next time, I will actually work on exciting things like finally adding a photo of myself!

One hundred!

Yay! I have published one hundred posts! Well, a few of them are re-blogs and some people publish a hundred posts in the space of a couple of weeks, but one hundred is a milestone for me, even though it took me ten months.

Fifty!

I just reached 50 followers, at least for a few moments! I know this is a tiny number for the number of months I have been blogging, but I wanted to thank my followers, even the people who only follow me to try to sell me something. 😉 If you like something that I have posted, please consider sharing the link with a friend who might like it, too. Thanks – or, as the Hawai’ians say – Mahalo!