blogging

I went ahead and took an impromptu break from the blog. Not that I have to explain myself, but I think it’d be useful to talk a little about my creative life lately and why the blog ended up getting cut. And what I plan for it in the future!

1. As proud as I was of my streak with daily posting, back in March I took a trip to St. Louis and missed a day. I’d already prepared to forgive myself — it seemed unlikely I’d post every day till I died. But that permission made me way more willing to leave the blog this week.
2. Recently I’ve been trying to make some lifestyle changes. What’s weird about changing your sleep schedule, for example, is that it feels like a whole day’s work. So I’ve been feeling busy, plus trying to manage two writing projects at once for the Substack. It’s been really hard, and I’m still putting way too much into each piece. Learning a lot! But I’ve been super stressed about the platform lately.
3. That stress makes it really hard to do explorative writing. I actually got to knuckle down on my Substack essay by falling back on the process, but I’m not getting excited about a lot of new ideas. Plus, since Substack feels like where my writing can have a life outside of myself, if I have an hour to sit down then I’ll be writing essays, not blog posts.
4. Explorative writing is what this blog is about. Since I’m overwhelmed by two ideas right now, I guess I’m not eager to add more. But the blog is also a lot of what helps me feel like a writer.

I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m glad that my self-esteem isn’t so tied up in routine, and I’m willing to set aside a project if it feels unhappy.

Last point: I’m a big proponent of building systems rather than forcing behavior, and if the blog doesn’t fit into my natural creative life then I need to address that. But the blog has also done a lot for me, and may be worth the extra effort.

For now I’m gonna get this essay going so I can bask in the glow of my achievement, then I’ll figure out where it all went wrong.

In the extremely unscientific chats I’ve had with friends, they’ve all described the same approach to reading the blog: every couple of days they catch up on those couple of days’ posts. That’s good. I often push a post out at 10 or 11, especially collection posts, which is a very unprofessional posting time.

Posting the same time every day, every week, boosts engagement. I remember I used to look up a subreddit analyzer to give my posts the best chance of being seen, before deciding Reddit is a place I don’t really want anything to do with. That’s sort of a sad behavior in hindsight. Not that you aren’t within your rights to maximize digital potential, but I sought to maximize my online likability and short-term gratification, not build a meaningful platform.

I can post whenever I want on the blog. It’s my online house, and posting at 11:59 p.m. is sort of like castle doctrine.

But when I’m taking advantage of another platform, it only feels polite to keep some kind of bank hours. I like the idea that somone could look forward to a post at an hour on a day.

But I hate the idea of needing something every single week. Would love that! Except that I have a full time job.

But isn’t variable reinforcement more effective anyway?

But should I apply behaviorism to my art? Is that not just the Reddit thing again?

When the going gets ugh, I do what’s best for me. Feeling a post every other Saturday, but I reserve the right to post an essay whenever it’s done.

There’s no exact science to word count. In general, anything less than 50 words is a poem or a social media post, then under 300 is a complete thought, a wire news article, or flash fiction. Most of my robust blog posts are in the 600-700 range. My published essays are both just over 2,000, but I’d call anything between 3-5k a “long essay.” My favorite piece of creative nonfiction, my favorite written thing, rings in at 10,000 words. (It’s Brian Phillips’ “Sea of Crises.” Stop reading this and start reading that.)

I’ve been trained to think in word counts by my day job. But there’s a relativity issue there, where the difference between 200 and 700 words is much greater than the difference between 2,500 and 3,000.

What I’m asking is: How many words does it take to convey a thought? And it depends on the thought. My instinct is, word count is useless as a judge of ideas, but it’s useful in the same way that resting heart rate is useful. Since I’m 50 days in the hole what with blogging, and I’ve tracked my word counts that whole time, I know what I can vomit out on a Sunday between errands or on a Monday when I get inspired.

My first draft of the Supernormal post is just over 900 — not that far off from my resting BPM. What does that indicate? Maybe I’m not exploring this idea as far as I should be. If I added 300, 500, 700 more words of context, maybe that would indicate a good sprint rather than a breezy jog.

Obsessing over metrics feels bad. I’m thinking of this high-stim word processor I saw on TikTok a while ago. Every time it registers a keystroke, a little heart or a sparkle pops out of the character count tab. There’s razzle dazzle, there’s noise, there’s cheering and gold medals. Writers need some way of feeling like all the clacking away actually has some meaningful result. We write in coffee shops to be seen. We track page views. Anything to give our work a life outside of ourselves.

What’s much harder is deciding that an idea is “done,” that it’s “explained enough.” That you’ve done the best you can do.

One day, I would like to feel like I can string together 10,000 meaningful words that tell a story, describe something, make an impact. At exactly this moment, I’m going to shoot for 1,200.

Combine that with the culture-wide hatred of things that teenage girls enjoy (the Twilight bloc again), and you’d think cell phone novels never caught on because they got smothered in the crib. Critics and advocates both assumed that cell phone novels would blow up our relationship to literature, that as cell phones grew in ubiquity the written word would fall to the touchscreen abbreviation. But that’s not what happened.

Today I wrote what I think is the first draft of my Cell Phone Novels piece, which will be the first post to Supernormal (my Substack). I want to get it right, but I also want to find a format that I can fit into a week — so while I won’t be posting the first draft, and I do want to get it right, I expect it’ll be another week before I have something ready to go.

I might use this space to talk through my plans and any issues I face, so be ready for that. Except I don’t want to call it “writing about writing.” Let’s call it… Substack Week!

At the end of Substack week, I’ll have started my Substack. During Substack week, I’ll commit to some outline regarding post length and frequency. I’ll also write about, I don’t know, Hero or The Bourne Identity or something. Gotta keep delivering the core product, you know how it is.

Happy Substack Week!

I’ve got a bunch of tabs open. Among them are three of my favorite Substacks. I’ll go through each one, break it down, and find something to steal.

My philosophy: Substack is a platform I’m really interested in, but not one I’ve rocked with extensively. I want to start before I feel ready (I think that’s a necessary skill in creative life), but I also want to make something I’m proud of. I’m a firm believer that you should work in a format you love and have opinions about. So let’s do our research before blitzing into something I end up not liking very much. (Although — I think I’ve picked out the name and topic. But that’s for a future post.)

Also, this isn’t going to be in any kind of review or critical format. I highly recommend you check out each of these.

internet princess by Rayne Fisher-Quann

Genre: Cultural criticism

Posts: ~1 month

Length: One idea, 1500-3000 words

internet princess is probably my favorite longform newsletter. I’m a magpie, my creative life is usually just scavenging for shiny things to steal. One thing that’s impossible to steal: someone’s original ideas developed through thoughtful observation. In other words, Rayne Fisher-Quann is extremely talented and I don’t believe that infinite bloggers on infinite typewriters could reproduce her work.

Her personal approach to writing inspires me, and that’s something I feel like I can adopt for myself. I’ve often wished I could steal her TikTok bio — “bringing blogging back.” Actually, I think it’s what inspired me to start this very blog. She writes in conversation with her readership, centers her personality in her writing, and doesn’t let herself be dominated by one Draconian rule. She wanders. She also describes the space as her “blog/newsletter/community hub” which I love, although I’m not sure I need a hub until I have spokes.

Also, I’m pretty sure she uses the default Substack layout, which thank GOD I don’t have to make things harder on myself.

Garbage Day by Ryan Broderick

Genre: Internet culture

Posts: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (and some weekends I think?)

Length: 5-10 ideas, one ~1,000 word and the rest 100-300 words

By the way — I really hope rendering length into word count isn’t super duper reductive. The ideas are obviously the most important in all of these, but word count helps me conceptualize time.

Which, jeez louise I don’t know how you turn out this kind of word count at this kind of quality three days a week. There’s a depth of knowledge in Garbage Day that I think just comes with doing this for a long time and having a lot of familiarity.

Also, something Travis McElroy said about podcasting applies: A lasting creative project should focus on a conversation you’re already having. Ryan Broderick pulls all sorts of examples, but I get the sense they’re things he’s finding in his life already. He just then gets to write about them. Which is super cool.

I don’t think this kind of quantity fits into my life right now — the posting rate or the post length — but I love the brisk format. I also love the “stray links” at the bottom.

Austin Kleon by… Austin Kleon

Genre: Creativity

Posts: Tuesday and Friday

Length: A 10 item list

Austin Kleon shapes a lot of my creative life these days. Specifically looking at his Substack though, I love a good numbered list (not a “7 wacky war crimes committed by Leos,” I mean like actually just a bulleted list of things) and I love a breezy read.

Looking at how his Substack fits into his larger writing life, I love that he repurposes the lists for his daily blog. Efficiency!

Last thing: I really admire artists who lead with their name. I worry so much that people won’t find “Dayten Rose” because it’s not spelled “Dayton.” Or they won’t know what it’s about. But it’s my blog! It’s about me!

 

I had a longer version of this in the chamber, but honestly I think I hit diminishing returns trying to write extensively about everything I read.

• Perfectly Imperfect — great newsletter! But I know I’m not angling at the interview format.
• The Art of Noticing — comes highly recommended, I just haven’t gotten around to reading as much of it as I’d like.
• The Honest Broker — from a writer with such extensive pedigree that I would collapse in on myself if I even thought to compare my work to his!

So, I’m left with these three. And they’re a really good three! I’m just not sure what they tell me. A personality-forward blog for essay-length writing on a topic I already enjoy, which includes numbered lists? A default Substack with my name attached? Probably all of these ideas will feature. Artists, like carpenters and comedians, build with material external to themselves. These three platforms inspire me, but it’s going to be impossible for me to create something that isn’t a combination of everything I’ve consumed and made a part of myself so far.

Pretty soon I’ll have something a little less abstract to show you. However I choose to describe it, I hope you’ll treat it well, because it’s me.

A late night, smooth jazz post for your Sunday. No commentary on whatever, just one or two clerical notes now that I’ve been doing this for a while. If you’re more interested in the blog rather than the writing of the blog, I’m proud of some of the ideas from yesterday. Although they betray a pretty general lack of understanding about professional poker.

The smooth jazz in question.

Having a space to explore new ideas, start a post before knowing exactly where it’s going to go, has been very productive. Feeling obligated to make that every post has not been so productive. I tend to wax long-winded.

Feeling totally free from the pressure of ever making longer posts sort of defeats the purpose. Daily posting is just numerically more taxing than weekly posting, but it’s a burden I took on because I thought it would help my writing. And it has!

From now on, I want to start identifying between “idea posts” and “collection posts.” Exhibit A, Exhibit B. The first lets me explore an idea, the second lets me share my collection — and in doing so, encourages me to collect more in my day-to-day.

I won’t be going on any strict posting schedule, but I would expect two idea posts Friday to Sunday, and one Monday to Thursday.

Then, of course, there’s planning posts like this one. Hopefully these are disappearingly rare. Next time I go for it, though, will be when I talk Substack and ideas worth sharing.

Blogging is maybe on the horizon of some kind of cultural moment. The Verge and Tedium (an excellent publication with excellent editorial taste) detect that, as Twitter’s twilight makes us question what’s possible with short-form content, the long-form of the blogosphere will recapture our attention.

I have mixed feelings on this. For it to come true is an objective positive (although, I swear I had decided to start this very blog prior to the New Year), but it’s hard for me as a young person to imagine something other than full-faucet media. To imagine art, rather than content.

Worth getting ahead of this early and often: I feel extremely unqualified as a trendspotter. There’s not a party alive I wasn’t late to. So I won’t even try to predict whether or not blogs will actually succeed — I hope they do — but like I said, I’m young, and it’s not something I’ve seen before. The shape of it is alien to me.

(This sort of doubles as an intro post to whatever it is I’m doing here. Hi!)

If I were to target the specific quality of blogging that feels beyond my attention, it’s this: the currency of the internet is specialization. You can’t just write, or take photos. You can’t make a YouTube channel for your Minecraft let’s plays and then post a recipe you made, and then make cultural commentary. All of those things feel very antiquarian to me, from an earlier time of social media. TikTokers bemoan that one viral joke dooms your account to forever be a retelling of that joke, changing the words slightly each time, until you are sorted into your usual obscurity.

There are fashion accounts, and there are cooking accounts. There are listicles, there are reviews, there are how-to’s. Here is the Fountain of Youth: to find one thing that you don’t mind doing forever, and do it. Forever.

Gosh, don’t think I’m bleak for saying this. I’m new to it is all. What charms me so much about a blog is that it’s a very personal space, where you don’t have to shape your ego to the peculiar demands of the machine. But because you’re not playing the machine’s game, you also don’t get the machine’s bounty: other people’s attention. Something tells me this is a feature, not a bug. You may not get to be a household name, but you can be a “Kansas City Star.”

I made an account on Substack the other day, anyway. You know, the one thing I really consider myself an expert in is D&D, so maybe I’ll write about that. I love reviews as a format. First thing, I should probably figure out how to make a good intro post to a blog. Scratch this one.