So, this happened.
TIME named this blog to its list of the 25 best blogs of 2012. Which, yes, I am totally bragging about, because I can. And because blogging for me has, this year, been a little bit harder than it has in previous years, and this feels all the sweeter for coming on the heels of a difficult year. In brighter moments this year, I’d have called blogging a ‘labor of love;’ in others, I’d have just called it labor. It’s hard maintaining a blog when you’re so squeezed for time that you miss things like, say, your kids’ childhood.
But still. I do it. I do it because when I don’t do it, I miss it. I do it because, although I could say all sorts of high and mighty and noble things about the radical cultural meaning of mom blogs and the revolutionary potential of mom-centred storytelling and motherhood is a feminist act blah blah blah, it all comes down to this: narrating the story of my motherhood has become so core to the experience of my motherhood that I could no sooner not do it than I could not care for my children. And I say that as someone who has locked herself in the bathroom – door shut against screaming children – just to get a post out. Go ahead, judge me.
I do it, in part, though, because I love my children — and because I am fascinated by my children and by the whole amazing and absurd experience of mothering my children and because I can’t imagine not documenting and interrogating those things. I do it, too, because I love my experience of motherhood and because I am fascinated by that (whole amazing and absurd) experience and because I can’t imagine not documenting and interrogating that. Mostly, though, I do it because it’s sort of become like stretching: something that I don’t need to do, exactly, but something that I want to do, something that I get the uncontrollable urge to do. I can’t explain why or when or how the urge to blog will come (and I can‘t always indulge that urge — slow blogging is the new black, you guys!) just that it does. Always, it does.
Anyway. This was nice news. There’s really nothing much deeper about it than that.
And sometimes that’s more than enough.
{ 11 comments }
Wow – what a complete and absolutely amazing honor. I want to use adjectives like stupendous, nearly impossible, 1 in a million chance – but I won’t.
‘Cuz you already know that
Congratulations!!!
So awesome! Congrats.
Much more than enough! Wonderful boost, that.
~~
Congrats, Catherine. So happy for you.
It’s quality, not quantity. And when you slow blog, you have so much to say. Your words are deep and meaningful and I appreciate them.
How wonderful. And to be included in such company! Congratulations are in order, mama.
To be able to go at your own pace, and still be rewarded for it, is wonderful.
Huge Congratulations. Well done.
Congratulations! Love the blog! Keep doing great things! No pressure though!
Congrats love! I admit to falling in to the “it’s a labor” camp. But the real truth is; I feel the same way and I love how well you express yourself in my brain. Oh, wait, that was out loud.
Not at all surprised to see you recognized but simply joyed to see it.
Congratulations! That is such an honor! Keep your props going strong. Yes: blogging is a labor of love and it takes a lot of time! But, like you said, it’s also a way to have an online diary with your family. So even though you may spend time away from them while writing….it’s only a short time. Keep it up because I enjoy reading your work. And you know it’s paying off with all the fabulous recognition! Fantastic!
When you are in love with something/someone, you can’t help it but spread the world about it… I know this feeling very well, and I know how fascinating it is for a woman to be a mother, and the feelings that she carries for her children might be so strong that she can’t keep them inside of her, she wants to let them out and to share them with her kids and the world.
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