April | 2014 | mrsfringe

After a teaser of spring yesterday, this morning is pure damp and gloom.

This week I thought quite a bit about social media, the concept of “platforms” and followings, blogging and tweeting. Mostly tweeting, because so far it’s the thing I’m having the hardest time catching the rhythm of.

I keep saying this, but I just don’t get it. I hop on dutifully most days, but usually end up feeling like the girl who needs electrolysis and a better girdle at a 1961 dance. There are the cool kids, the nerdy kids, the popular rah-rah we’re running your student government kids, and the wallflowers. Then there are the spammers. Please, for the love of all that is holy, stop it! I will usually follow links from new followers, check out blogs, etc. But if you’re tweeting multiple times a day for days, weeks, months on end about how I should buy your book, just stop it. I will start to remember your name/title of book, but only to make a note not to purchase it. But they say it’s a good thing to do, have a Twitter account and tweet, so I keep trying. I favorite, I retweet, I reply, occasionally I send out a tweet. Somehow it isn’t shocking when no one cares what I ate for dinner. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s not going to be the thing that gets me/my writing noticed.

Is blogging going to help me? I have no clue. As I query, some agents want to know about “web presence,” a more common term than platform when querying fiction. My stats won’t make anyone drool, but hopefully won’t make them cringe, either. If anyone looks closely enough, I think it could help that I tend to have long term followers who are engaged (thank you!). Maybe an agent or two will like the content, think I’m someone they’d be interested in working with. Or *gasp* become a follower. Maybe not. Maybe they’ll click onto the blog and be disgusted by my appalling language. (If so, they probably wouldn’t be into my fiction, either.) Maybe they’ll think, “Wow, this woman is a fucking fruitcake, I’m steering clear.”

If you hadn’t noticed, I like blogging. Mrs Fringe isn’t an overnight sensation, but I’ve got Fringelings, and gather more on a weekly, sometimes daily basis. Many can relate to that feeling of living on the fringe. As a wannabe writer, I should be keeping a blog about writing. Yawn. Pretty sure I’ve said this before, but I find most blogs on writing to be tedious. Writers, their individual lives and processes? Interesting. A good blog with an thoughtful or entertaining voice will compel me to follow links and click the little buy button for a book. Does this make me a voyeur?

No longer needed (Photo credit: eric.r)

Could be. Blogging lets me ramble with no pressure. I look at the blogs that hit it big, and the blogs that barely get any views, and sometimes, not always, but sometimes, it’s hard to see why one way or the other. My buddy kk blogged about this yesterday. I enjoy different bloggers and blogs, like making connections through reading and commenting. I don’t read and comment as frequently as I did when I started. Honestly, it gets harder to do the more followers I have, and I apologize to those whose blogs I’m not stopping by often enough. Every view, every like, every comment is important and valuable to me, thank you. It’s a process, I’m learning the curve. So I’m saying to kk and anyone else trying to figure out this blogging thing, relax. Figure out what you most enjoy blogging about, the voice that feels the most comfortable.

It’s Friday again. Not sure if Fatigue will come for Friday Night Madness, his pup has been sick. But if he does, we’ll have dinner and our usual routine discussing the trials and tribulations of being a wannabe in New York, trying to make it; one pen/voice/monologue/dance routine trying to hold firm and be noticed among millions. Funny, because I grew up here, pretty much always lived here, I always knew I wasn’t special by virtue of being a wannabe, having a dream I didn’t want to give up. Maybe the internet and social media have done the same for everyone everywhere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qm6IJIVWLT4

Mine came in the mail, how do you get yours?

Until 5 minutes ago, I didn’t own any sneakers, hadn’t owned any in years. I’m just not a sneaker gal. They usually require laces and socks, and I’m not a fan of either of those. Not to mention how closely associated they are with athletic pursuits. Let me say right now, if you toss a ball to me, my only instinct is to cringe and cover my face.

Still having issues with my back which rule out many of the shoes I already own, and to my great disappointment, it’s still too cool outside for flip-flops. But…it’s also getting sort of warm for the practical, comfy, fake shearling lined shoes I’ve been wearing. Hence my online shopping extravaganza. I hoped for gray or white, but no such luck. You know what they say, beggars-who-are-too-cheap-to-pay-full-price can’t be choosers.

Not too bad, as far as third choice colors go. I remember my first pair of Pro-Keds, banana yellow. I know, my mother couldn’t believe it either. I have a clear memory of sitting in the elementary school gym and squeaking the soles against the inch thick polyurethane glazed floor, trying to tell myself that Susie McSnobby may have new tell-tale threads from a new ear piercing* dangling from her ears, but I had cool sneakers. Just as good. Almost as good. Ok, it’s true, I hated the fucking things from that moment on. Come to think of it, that may have been the last yellow anything I ever chose. Converse are still fun, though, and I’ve owned several pairs since then–all suitably white or black. And now some of my favorite songs from high school are running through my head. Mostly from The Who. Maybe I wore sneakers to that concert.

**A long time ago, in an alternate universe where parents never heard of car seats or cabinet locks, and didn’t think twice about a 14 day course of antibiotics because kiddo sneezed twice, ears were pierced with needles and threads. The needle got pushed through, the thread left behind to keep the hole open until it was “healed” enough to stick an earring in.