A-Z reflections: At the end of something or other - n still Zetetic, though Zonked...

For some vague reason this song has been bzzzzzing in my head…so I might as well share it here.  

As with the other years, intrepid stranger or close friend, you pays no money, but you gets your choice - take your pick -

The short version

This marks my fifth straight year at the A-Z Challenge, wow and whoa! Who woulda thunk, right?!

For circumstances various and unfathomable, this was a superquiet Challenge. But…glad I was here, and that I’ve survived. Not once, but five years running. Reason enough for the celebratory smug-as-a-bug-in-a-rug! :)  

I will be forthwith reverting back to my bloghopless state and weekly poetry/fic postings, except for Write…Edit…Publish… of course. See you soon. Till then and beyond, stay happy and well!

The lo-o-o-o-o-ng version

This marks my fifth straight year at the A-Z Challenge, wow and whoa! Who woulda thunk, right?!

Yeah, I need to get over myself – I know! :) There are more things in heaven and earth Horatio, than can be dreamt of in the smug-as-a-bug-in-a-rug earning of bragging rights at a bloghop, even five years running.

I agree Sirji! I will dispel the smug directly.

From little drops to a splashy puddle

In five years, I’ve written my way from Awdl to Zajal, from Ahlan to Zellige, from Amazigh to Ziwa, and many other things in between. I’ve researched the daylights out of some topics and have had to, regretfully, let others go. I’ve learnt blogging lessons and life lessons and a whole heap of trivia. I’ve had blog fatigue and book ideas and time crunches and family crises and country moves. I’ve struggled and I’ve muddled through and I’ve faintly overcome and been overcome with faintness. In all situations, I have thoroughly enjoyed myself.

So what have I learnt? - Here’s the distilled wisdom from five back-to-back challenges survived.

1) What goes around comes around, but only sometimes – unfair but true. Not everyone will do unto you as you do unto them as far as reciprocal visits/comments go. Most bloghops have a fairly large proportion of people who follow a no-first-click policy, and some who never engage even when others visit/comment on their blogs. Do NOT let this throw you off your game. Because the sense of accomplishment when you hit publish at Z? - a many-splendoured groovy thing, I kid you not.

2) Success is an ill-defined beast – For a long time, I was always looking at numbers, for a quantifiable definition of success – how many pageviews, how many comments, how many followers gained - make participation in a bloghop successful? The answer was a big, fat, puzzled silence.

I have signed up early, signed up late, not signed up at all when the challenge went listfree. Written poetry and prose. To ubertiny wordcounts, and humongous mini-dissertations. The patterns were. Precisely.  Nil. Not a whiff of a single quantifiable relationship between any of the variables. Then I’ve stopped wracking my brains for golden rules and hey presto! the golden rule has come and whacked me on the nose.

3) Success is measured in enjoyment, and a challenge is its own reward. No matter what my themes or visitor counts were – I have loved the research that each of the A-Zs required. I did not assume my readers need ‘easy-peasy, cheesy’ topics, that every last A-Zer was only interested in how lightly s/he could read and how quickly click away. Paring my posts would interfere with my own A-Z high, not going to happen! It’s up to each one of us to define our own parameters for success. Choose yours and have fun.

4) Each day is a journey, and the journey itself is home a learning curve - I’ve learnt a whole heap of blogging because of the A-Z. How to schedule posts. How to create a live link, or to figure out the permalink for a post before it is live. Visiting, commenting, critiquing – all take practice, and being at the A-Z has improved my skills on each of these. I’ve learnt to venture into the most fearsome territory of all - the dreaded html and work there without getting jelly-knees. When you’re in the midst of the Challenge you don’t notice these things - the learning curve seems quite flat. But it increases incrementally, infinitesimally. Little drops of water make the mighty ocean. Over five A-Zs that’s quite a splashy puddle if not an entire sea.

5) Takeaways are never negative – Whether an experience is pleasant or unpleasant, the takeaway is always in the positive zone. Always something useful – a blogging tip, a fun fact, an idea, a travel wishlist, a book/film reco, horizons broadened an inch at a time – some little thing that you can get out of every single experience, even something as ‘virtual’ as a bloghop. There’s potential in any situation, just be open to it.

Lists! Lists! Lists! And listless…

My 2018 has been almost as stressful personally as my 2017, therefore my A-Z goals have got tweaked accordingly. I did not go all out to read new blogs aggressively this year, confined myself to reciprocal comments after the first week. Given my situation that has worked out fine.

The new daily list formats, I have to say, haven’t – not a fan. Listfree was a cakewalk compared to this! The main A-Z blog posting to GMT also threw a largish spanner in the works - meant there were US links on there, which were still scheduled several hours away at the time the daily list went live. I clicked and drew a series of pages not found. For this to work, all bloggers who put in advance permalinks on the lists, would also need to schedule to GMT with military precision - yikes! 

GMT also meant I lost about 4-6 hours of exposure as I didn’t realise the permalink could be posted in advance till well into April – missed the memo on that one. Last year the A-Z posts went live well in advance of GMT so that Aussie/Indian/Far n Middle Easterner participants would not lose any exposure, can’t fathom why this was changed…

Anyways, the Google forms just felt like one hoop too many to jump through - I gave up on the daily caper after sometime. It did say they were 'optional' somewhere. Dropping out from there kept my visitors/comments at a level I could handle. So, less stress all round. Perfecto.

Hmmm, what else?...oh yes, what happened to the survivor's badge? I've got back to the A-Z every year only so I can pin another one on the blog! Mildly miserable that I couldn't claim my fifth... and since we are on the subject, my preference for the old postmark/bookstamp design way, way outstrips the new, 'user-friendly' version...

Heartfelt thanks to my regular readers – Elephant’s Child, David at The Lair of the Silver Fox and Joanne at Word Splash for their unstinting support throughout the month. Your words and encouragement are prized beyond rubies. Also to Damyanti at Daily (W)rite  for sharing each one of my posts quietly, as she always does. Value your endorsement and your thoughtfulness, Damyanti, thank you! Among the A-Zers my thanks go out to Hilary at Positive Letters, Inspirational Stories, Deborah at Temenos of the Blessing Light, Hester at Dis Ekke, (both of you ladies, thanks also for supplying me with the title of this post!) Kristin at Finding Eliza, Yamini at Doses of Wild Yam, and a special round of thanks and applause for Zalka Csenge Virag at The Multicoloured Diary for co-hosting the A-Z with her usual charm. Appreciate your visits and kind words and your fascinating A-Z folktale posts. 

Like last year I, and I’m sure other returning A-Zers, missed Ninja Captain Alex’s presence and his unobtrusive but towering co-hosting skills and his unfailing courtesy that kept ye olde collective morale up.

Morale – that’s the word. Some corner's sagged a little. Take a peek at the sign-ups, at the theme-reveals. Check out the A- and the Z-post list. Have a read through the comments on the main blog. As I said before, it’s not just about the numbers, the sign ups were probably higher than last year’s. It’s more about the feeling. At M-i-V, this was the first year in which April pageviews actually dropped compared to March, that's never ever happened in the history of this blog whether I was at the A-Z or not - gobsmacked! All in all, it felt like something’s bled out this year, some zing’s gone missing…no idea why. But as an avid A-Z fan, it makes me feel vaguely bereft. 

So. For circumstances various and unfathomable, this was a superquiet Challenge. But…I’m glad I was here and that I’ve survived. Not once, but five years running. Reason enough for the celebratory smug, which is now firmly dispelled. :)

I will be forthwith reverting back to my bloghopless state and weekly poetry/fic postings, except for Write…Edit…Publish… of course. See you soon. Till then and beyond, stay happy and well! 



Posted for the A-Z Reflections