Photo by Jan Kahánek on Unsplash
Whenever I need to write a longish bio for myself, one jokey fact emerges over and over — I started writing on the Internet after I begged an acquaintance for a Livejournal invite in 2002.
Remember LiveJournal? The small rotation of avatars? Music and mood tags? Custom animated emoticons before emoji were a thing? (Mine were either stars or cats.)
I hopped from username to username, from public to friends only. It was a playground of possibilities, somewhere between self-publishing and a Web 1.0 proto-social media. My readers were my sister and a bunch of Internet friends with shared nerdy interests. It was chaotic, a little cringey, and the place I began to find my writing voice.
In the waning days of 2022, it makes my brain hurt a little to realize that yes, I started blogging in some fashion 20 years ago. I’ve written on Blogger, Wordpress, and Tumblr. I’ve done all the major millennial social media things — Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. As for email newsletters, a haphazard TinyLetter did the trick for 5-ish years.
And so, here I am on the latest platform. Starting a Substack, like a real and proper Writer on the Internet.
Truth is, I have taken a quiet break from longform writing. Not because I necessarily wanted to. It’s more because some days I think I’ve forgotten how to write anything longer than a poem or an Instagram caption.
I suppose pandemic brain is part of it. When I review my collective output, I see a dip sometime around 2020. I have enough writing adjacent gigs to justify calling myself a writer by trade, but there’s a difference between writing for work and just… writing for yourself.
Another reason for the slowdown is, well… *gestures vaguely at earth in 2022* It’s tiring, this world. Not to mention many thoughts that occupy my mind are things I don’t really feel ready to write about publicly.
But, as it always goes, I miss writing. I miss sharing. I miss connecting with a few folks over the things I write. I’d like to try again.
Back in June, I imported all my old TinyLetter posts over here, telling myself I would restart that project someday. My fellow writers are making some really cool things on Substack, and I’m intrigued by the idea of a middle space between the email newsletter, the classic blog, and the interconnection of social media.
So, here goes. This is Alongside Letters 2.0. I wanted to give it a new name, but I couldn’t think of anything better. I still like the idea of Alongside though — an implication that we are traveling together, that I am inviting you along to wherever this goes.
I don’t know what it wants to be or how often I’ll write. I know I have a new poetry book coming out this spring, so of course I’ll talk about that. I hope to nurture my spiritual direction practice in the coming year, so I’d love to explore what I’m learning there. And well, I’m turning 40 this summer. You know there’s gonna be a whole lot of emotion and reflection that comes with that.
I also know winter is here, and a new year makes me want to slow all the way down and process. Maybe it would be nice to have a fresh, clean space on the internet to do that.
So… let’s give it a go.
If you got this in your email, it’s because you signed up for my TinyLetter some time ago. If you would like to opt out, please feel free and go in peace. I don’t know how often I’ll send these out yet, so I can’t even tell you what you’re signed up for! :)
But if you’re interested enough to stick around, well, it’s good to have you here.