Blast From The Past

How can you resist??

What you write above your post is just as important as what you write below in your post.

A post title is like a newspaper or magazine headline. When you’re standing in the grocery store line, and you have NO plans at all of purchasing a magazine, you just can't. Budget orders and all. BUT still your eyes fall to the headline that is your siren call. “Madonna’s Secrets to a Perfect Stomach” the magazine promises. “Oooooh,” you think, “I’d like a stomach like Madonna’s.”

You can’t help yourself, you find yourself reaching for the magazine in hopes that, yes, you, too, can get what the headline promises.

That’s the power of a good title. It’s a magnet that draws in your audience. If you write a stellar post, and you’d like to showcase it, then you just have to title it that way. There are so many opportunities for your post title to be seen, might as well make it a good one.

Let’s say you have posted what you feel is your best humor piece ev-er, regarding your threadbare yoga pants that have finally bitten the dust. You’ve worked on it, it shines, it makes you laugh every single time you have re-read it before finally pushing “Publish.” You want the world to laugh with you, it’s just so good. But, how do you get people to see it?

You ask yourself, what would you want to read ? “My yoga pants are old,” or would you be pulled in by the enticing “Naked and Threadbare in Yoga Class.”

Your post title can be seen in so many more places than just your blog. It’s the first thing visible in RSS feeds, it’s displayed in other blogger’s blogrolls, it can be seen with the comments you leave on other blogs. I myself have hopped over to another blog being lured by the post title left in the comment box. Who wouldn’t click over to “Exploding Yoga Pants and You: What You Need to Know.”

Twitter will show your post title, so will your Facebook page. Search Engines will pick up your post title keywords: someone will google “Yoga Pants” and Voila! arrive at your doorstep, and returning again if they like what they find at your blog.

Post titles are displayed on your own blog, under “my favorite posts.” A good post title will work that way, it will draw people to come  to your blog, and want to meet you. Of course, you still have to deliver. We all know the mantra, "content is king. content is king. content is king..." (sorry, fell into my ohmmmm moment there...).

So, let's take time with our post title, let's be creative: try switching the order of the words around. Take the few extra minutes required to think of something unique and enticing.

We can call a post “Heritage.com Says I Look Like A Man” or “Ashton Kutcher is My Twin.” Now, wouldn’t you be powerless and click over to find out more based on that promise of information of how a blogger you know is related to Ashton? I know I would. Wait, both would work for me...I'm easy like that. 

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Blast From The Past

 My Most Difficult Blogging Moment


I still remember the shock of it all, and how very personally I took it.

I had told myself that it wouldn’t happen to me, that I wasn’t that type.

Those kinds of things happened to others, the other kind of people. And, if it did happen to me, I wouldn’t be affected. Other kinds of people were pulled into that, but I’m not other kinds of people. I’m solid, and rock steady, and sure of myself.

Turns out I was that other kind of people.

I never saw it coming–I think that’s what sets all the gears in motion. The unexpectedness of it, the force with which the surprise attack hits you.

Welcome to the world of Your First Negative Comment.

Yes, I reacted in all the ways I said I wouldn’t. I reacted in the ways I had seen what I had judged to be lesser people react. I would click my tongue and tsk away when I’d see a blogger spend an entire post on defending herself against the negative word comments. “Sheesh,” I’d mutter, “get a grip, it’s just a negative comment. Get over it.” 

Wait till you walk a mile in the shoes, I now say.

I wish I would’ve had a camera mounted on my screen to show my unsuspecting face, smiling, reading, laughing my way through the lovely comments on a post I had written on the surliness of my teenage son. I’d pat myself on the back and tell myself how lucky I was to have such wonderful bloggy friends.

Then, as I continued reading through my post's comments, I found myself having to lean in closer to the screen, furrowing my brow, then opening my eyes and mouth in disbelief ( are you with me now in the moment?) as I realized that SOMEONE did not like what I had written. SOMEONE named Anonymous told me I didn't have a brain in my head and was a silly woman. Someone continued on to say that my post was something barely recognizable and passable as a blog entry.

To say I fell off my chair in a crumpled mass is an understatement. But, those words made me do just that.

I now question why I let a comment from a stranger affect me the way I did. I don’t know why, but I did. The coment  had hurt me on all levels. It attacked my son, it attacked me as a mother, it came out of nowhere. I think it’s that element of surprise that hits your raw, vulnerable, unprotected nerve. And, of course, they’re slamming your kid….not a good feeling.

How to get over this? I didn’t address the commenter, (couldn’t anyway…since they were anonymous.) But, I felt too frail, in that moment, to even put out another post. Was I silly? Were my posts sadly lacking? I had to deal with this issue.

I decided to post on how my feelings had been hurt, by a negative comment. I didn’t defend my post, or put down the commenter. I just posted on how maybe I am a silly woman who posts on some not so serious things, and so what. It’s who I am. To my surprise, that post did more for me than I ever could have foreseen.

All my wonderful readers came from the east, south, north, and west, to my defense. I was loved upon over and over and lifted up high and in receipt of multiple, virtual, electronic hugs of love.

That negative comment turned out to be an opportunity for me to see all the beauty of the lovely bloggers that do exist in the majority of the blogosphere. From something bad, something very, very  good. The response to my post affirmed what I had already been coming to believe since I began blogging; that bloggers are a very special breed. That just as easily as one is bruised and knocked down on the internet,  one is just as quickly held and comforted and loved right back up again.

Thank you, my lovely, lovely bloggy friends. And, if  any negative commenters come knocking at your post's door? I got your back.
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This week, I'll be running some of my favorites from the past.  This post was originally a guest post for Gigi. Thanks for keeping it safe, Geeg.

Peace, Love, Health, Happiness and Thank You!

My best wishes to all of you, who have become part of my daily life.

I wish you a year of happiness, kindness, a few good surprises along the way, a new adventure or two (because something different is always fun),  and going beyond your comfort zone at least once. Let's push it even further and wish for one thing off your bucket list, too. Oh, and health! Yes, health.

I also wish you friendships, with people who will be there for the ups and downs that are part of life.

As you all have been for me.

I love you all, and I thank you for the love, support, and kind extension of your hand in friendship to me.

You've given me a magical 2010...and I can't thank you enough. Just know my words of gratitude and appreciation for you are sincere.

Happy New Year, my wonderful friends. You've blessed me with "a good year, a glad year, a year of happiness. Filled with kindly friendship, shining with success."

Always, xo

Still Fits

My Poet, 14 yrs old today

You, my special boy, are 14 years old today.

How this happened? Anybody? Drop me a line, because I turned away for a second, and there it was.

You are the one I can write the most about and you are the one that leaves me with my pen poised in the air over my paper, unable to find the words that fit. You did this to me when you were just ten days old, when you reached for my face with your little hand, when you heard my voice. You left me astounded, speechless, then, and you still do now.

When you were almost 2 years old, you brought me a picture of a tiger you had drawn, complete with black stripes and green eyes, swishy tail with the hair tuft detailed at the end. I didn't even know you could hold a crayon yet. Your drawings still leave me shaking my head, in disbelief.

When you were almost 2 years old, you spelled your name out with the wooden alphabet train letters we had. Not a single letter was missed. I have the picture. I knew no one would believe me. People still don't.

When you were almost 2 years old, you scared my oldest sister by naming all the planets in the solar system, while you climbed on the swings at the park. She asked me that afternoon in the summer, "aren't you scared he can do all that?"  She still doesn't get you, and I catch her watching you with curiousity.


You've never scared me.

You've always amazed me. A-mazed.

You are the least like the me I am now, and the most like the me I would have been, if people had let me.

Your needs are clear, direct, and never require guessing.

Your feelings are public, where mine have been tamed into society accepting quiet.

You know what you need. The way you have been able to organize all your passions, kept in order in your room, the need to rush upstairs for quiet after you return from a fully scheduled day, your dislike for being hurried. I see you, and I remember all these same feelings.

I understand it all. I did when you were small, and I still do now.

You are direct with your communication, there is no gray.

Which is why this picture, this picture, is one I can't tear my gaze away from today.

What is it that you really think? What do you see? Does something make you wonder?

For your birthday today, I've tried to complete the list you carefully and deliberately detailed for me, about the things you want.

Do you think you could, today, as a small token of affection for me, provide me with the same careful, deliberate details, about you?

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Happy, wonderful, birthday, to my sweet, sweet poet Maximus. 

I love you.

I hope you have an amazing birthday day, and receive everything you wished for. 

Love, forever, mama 


*I decided to call this post "Still Fits," since a poem I wrote for Maximus, when he was 4 yrs old, still fits him to this day. 

Holiday Greetings And Saving Myself A Stamp

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

With Royal Love (the best kind), 

Alexander-15, Maximo-14, Baby E-8

and

The Emperor & Empress, Mark and Alexandra