“Today’s assignment: consider what you want to accomplish with your blog. Write down three concrete goals.” —Blogging 201, Day One: Set Three Goals
Multimedia Monday is all about ME today. As egocentric as that sounds, I mean it in the most positive manner. I made a decision last week to “shake things up” in my creative world and took the first step when I joined NaNoWriMo 2015.
This past weekend I signed up for the WordPress Blogging 201 course. It is an opportunity to take an inventory of this blog and look at the future direction of my efforts.
A Little History
My first blog post was on December 17, 2011 and my stated goal was “… to reminisce about my journey through life as a Union Electrician and to discuss today’s challenges, while keeping an eye on the Future.” I am not happy with that statement today, but it was a starting point and every journey begins somewhere.
“You don’t have to see the entire
staircase. Just take the first step.”
—Martin Luther King
Four years ago I wanted to have an outlet to tell stories, if only to clear some “disk space” on the hard drive inside my head. I thought that if I got the stories out of my head and onto paper, or cyberspace, then I would have room for new tales and adventures to share.
“Out with the old, and in with the new” would be my motto. I knew that I would be retiring from the Electrical Trade within three years and I felt that I needed to develop a hobby/outlet for the rest of my life. Two to three years of practice would give me enough time to see if this could be the answer for that looming deadline.
Ohm Sweet Ohm was one year-old in 2012 and many changes were taking place. I was beginning to be part of a network of interesting bloggers. Some of us shared interests and others of us appreciated each other from afar. No matter the connection between us, we communicated with each other and shared our thoughts and opinions (if asked).
2012 was also the year that I got into mobile photography on my iPhone. With the help and encouragement from some absolute Masters in the Art, I have been able to improve my skills significantly and I am ever so grateful for the help that was so freely given. The WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge is an on-going arena to push myself creatively and to meet more great photographers from around the world.
As far as the written word goes, 2012 ushered in some unexpected accolades. In August one of my posts was featured by WordPress on their Freshly Pressed page and my readership suddenly increased.
I also participated in National Novel Writing Month for the first time and spent the month of November writing a memoir of my start as an Electrician’s apprentice. This experience was invaluable to me because I learned that I could reach down inside of me and and unlock memories and experiences that I could share with others.
By 2013 my team of followers and trusted bloggers had grown to over 1800 members. I had posted over 500 entries to my blog. This post-employment experiment was starting to look entirely doable.
The Online community provided me with a lot of encouragement and helpful comments and suggestions. I was able to reach out for help with one hand, and extend the other to help the next person. In March of 2013 I was honored when WordPress selected another one of my posts to be Freshly Pressed.
The lessons gained in the NaNoWriMo challenge and the inspiring work of the bloggers that I followed were having a positive impact on my efforts to expand my skill-set. Ohm Sweet Ohm was becoming a pleasure for me to work with at this time.
April of 2014 marked the beginning of the rest of my life. I retired after 46 years in the trade, the last 15 at the Golden Gate Bridge. I quickly learned that as a retired person the concept of “not going to work today” was permanent. They weren’t expecting me and I had no plans to show up. The world was spinning on greased grooves.
Last year was also confirmation that my 3-year experiment of blogging was working. I was taking the time to do something that I enjoyed and sharing the results with my Online community. I joined a local Writers group for a few months in the Fall and learned quite a bit about the process.
There were two highlights in 2014:
- I won an online contest over at Bucket List Publications and went on a Jetpack flight in Newport Beach, Ca.
- I started this weekly feature, Multimedia Monday.
2015 and Beyond
Almost eighteen months have passed since I stopped going to work on a regular basis. Time takes on a new meaning when you don’t have to be somewhere. The Lioness and I have had the opportunity to travel and work together on projects around the house.
We enjoy our life together here in Northern California and this phase of life has given me the opportunity to expand my talents in the field of blogging. Scheduling conflicts caused me to leave the Writers group in January and I have been rather sporadic ever since when it comes to storytelling. This brings us full circle to the beginning of this post: What do I want to accomplish with Ohm Sweet Ohm?
Three Goals:
- I want to publish 3 non-photo related, written posts a week from now until the end of October.
- By the end of 2016 I want to have posted glimpses of 6 stories that are worth expanding and adding to a collection. (Thanks to Steve at Brewer’s Baseball and Things for this idea)
- Produce a slideshow of photos that I have taken with my iPhone(s).
You are cordially invited to join me on this journey.
Buckle up—it may be a bumpy ride,
Ω