The other day this blog had a quiet Milestone - viewership is now over 4 million page views.
I kind of stopped counting when I realized that bots were 'raiding' sites like mine, selling the active URL addresses so they could start making comments on posts and advertise their own product. Some of them, at least, made a comment that was 'appropriate' (sort of) to my content, but most didn't bother, just added their name and a link to their website to 'advertise' to my readers.
And then I had the harasser, and started moderating comments. It meant a little more work on my part, but it was worth it, I felt.
Now we are dealing with AI scraping content. I suppose some bright spark will eventually figure out how to scrape blogs for their content too. I'm hoping the whole house of cards collapses before they get to that point.
As usual humans have taken what was once a good idea and fouled the waters so much it's getting aggravating to even participate.
Someone asked me when I would get back to playing Scrabble - something that filled many hours while I was recovering from the brain bleed. But the ads were irritating so much I couldn't enjoy playing the game anymore.
I still have a couple of games I'm playing, but they keep changing the rules and I'm wondering when they start increasing their ads.
As we enter the holiday season, I'm seeing lots of independent creative folk (like myself) trying to get the word out about the things we sell. And I find myself adding to the noise, because I do still have books that people be interested in, classes they might find helpful.
And I am torn. I know so many people are hurting in so many ways right now, do I want to add to the noise?
Current events continue to run like a flooding river and the uncertainty is...overwhelming...at times. But I'm pretty sure that the world will not end with a bang, but a whimper. And it won't be everywhere, all at once. And so, for some of us, life will go on, one way or another. Plus weaving may very well become a survival skill once again, not a hobby.
I see new weavers popping in on groups, quite sincerely wanting to know more, learn how. And so I keep trying. To reach out. To make new weavers aware. To remove the stigma of perfection that kills good. To pause and reflect on what they are actually doing. And that to be good is, quite frequently, good enough.
Yes, yes, we all strive for 'perfection', but weaving is complex and takes years of learning to get even close to good *in every circumstance* - because change one thing, and everything can change.
Not to mention our bodies age, wear out, get injured. Sometimes, one needs to face the facts and adjust what and how we are doing something. And go back to 'beginner' mind and feel frustrated. Just like I felt when I dressed the small loom and had road blocks and things go wrong the whole time.
But! It's ready now. I've just run out of spoons to try and weave on that loom today. So I'm going to stop for the day and try to relax and not worry too much about what comes tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. Trying to stay in the moment. For someone who used to use planning calendars because I needed to plan things 6 and farther out from 'now', it's a bit of a challenge. The most important thing is to remember that things *have* changed and I need to change in response *to* those changes.
But I can still weave. Hopefully I can keep writing. And most of all, I can keep lighting candles.
And that's not a bad thing. Not at all.
I think I posted all the links for my stuff yesterday. Scroll down if you want to use them.
No comments:
Post a Comment