In my 32 years of living, I have made 9* blogs. This blog will be 10th.
I typically start a new blog the same way. I title it “Hello World”, and discuss the framework and technologies I’m excited to try out. I imagine this is a common first-blog entry for web developers. I’m going to try really hard to resist talking about the new technology stack I’m using, but I make no promises.
Before I spent a week or so cobbling together a new blog, with yet another framework, I spent some time thinking: “Why bother even making a new blog? I abandon all my blogs anyway.”
My previous blog had its first entry on April 11, 2019 (Unsurprisingly titled “Why I Chose GatsbyJS For My Website”), and its last post on October 03, 2019 (A small how-to on creating CSS Variables). I have been meaning to update it for over two years now. This nagging thought festered until two weeks ago when it finally boiled over and I started creating a new blog that I know I’ll one day eventually stop updating. This blog is not going to live on forever.
But then again, how long is a blog supposed to last? This thought struck me while I rounded the corners learning the ropes of Hugo (I almost made it the whole way without mentioning the framework, Go me!)
For so long, abandoned blogs felt like small personal failures. Like it demonstrated my lack of discipline, or my inability to properly prioritize my free time. Finding time to write has felt like a struggle my whole life.
But you know what? Despite all my “failed” blogging projects, here I am again today, creating yet another blog that I know will ultimately be abandoned. No, I don’t have a long, impressive archive like John Gruber or John Siracusa, and honestly I don’t think I ever will. But I still do love writing and making things for the web.
And I know my love for both will continue, long after this blog has ended.
Addendum
Technically I had more than 9 blogs. More accurately I’ve used 9 different platforms for blogging, but that didnt sound as poetic.
- Angelfire
- Geocities
- Xanga
- Livejournal
- Blogger (I have 6 blogs on blogger.)
- Tumblr (I had 3 active/primary tumblr’s)
- Myspace (I’m counting myspace. You could alter your html. Don’t @ me.)
- Wordpress
- GatsbyJS