Giving Thanks for My Blog, "A Page from a Sage"

It was in March of 2010 that I made my first-ever visit to a blog. That will give you an indication of how slow I have been to learn about internet trends, since blogging has been popular for quite a few years now.

I had published a short poem as a tribute to my mother on 2/16/10, and on 3/06/10 this comment appeared following the poem: This really touched my girlfriend so I added it to my blog. :) jeffrey http://dionysusmused.blogspot.com/2010/03/poem-sometimes-we-cant.html.

Jeffrey is Jeffrey Weeks, who not only has an outstanding array of content as a yahoo! Contributor Network writer, but also maintains a poetry blog plus an additional four blogs which are listed on his content page. So my visit to Jeffrey's poetry blog served as my introduction to the creative world of blogging (thank you, Jeffrey!) and the moment in time when a seed was planted into my spirit regarding the creation of my own blog.

That seed which was planted a year ago has now sprouted; I have confidence that the sprout will eventually blossom, flower, and continue to bloom. However, if it is to be, it will be up to me - as work progresses on my blog I will need to keep myself stirred up with sufficient enthusiasm and remain focused on my purpose for my fledgling blog to ever amount to anything.

A bit of background

My first attempt at blogging took place last summer. I set up not one but four blogs (how grandiose was that planning!) on blogger.com. Nothing seemed to come together for me, and everything I dabbled at was daunting and eventually fruitless.

When I recently decided to devote some serious time and effort to blogging, I looked into the WordPress publishing platform and felt that it offered some advantages over blogger.com. I scrapped everything that I had done and started over with WordPress. Last weekend, with the help of my son, I got a WordPress template in place that has the customization features that seem to work for me, began the task of organizing categories and tags, and actually started doing some posting from my yahoo! content site.

The title of the blog popped into my head about a week ago; as a spirit-led individual I followed through on the thought and looked up the definition of "sage." There were words in the numerous definitions that spoke to me, namely: age and experience (I have both); prudent, judicious (I like to think I have acquired a certain level of good judgment); reflective; discerning; well adapted to the purpose, and a mentor.

The word "sage" seems a bit lofty to me, but it does rhyme with page (grasping at straws here?) which fits into my publishing theme. Also, the definitions that I found applied to the word "sage" itself will give me something for which to strive. In short, the name works for me for now, and everything on a blog can be edited, changed, and improved upon with time should I come up with a better title.

Today I am giving thanks that I actually have a working blog. My new links work, I know the rudiments of adding a new post, and I have even managed to add a couple of widgets for a calendar and archiving. There are widgets for just about everything - 99% of them are outside of my level of understanding at this time.

I love to learn new things, and it was downright bugging me that the blog concept had seemed out of reach of my level of capability. Just knowing that I can do this has satisfied me at some level of my subconscious.

At the present time

I'm practicing posting by adding individuals posts to my blog containing numerous links to my previously published articles. That process is teaching me how the text looks on my blog when copied either from Word or from my content page, provides me with opportunities to practice linking, and has helped me figure out tags.

While I'm working to link older articles, I'm also posting newly published articles on my blog to see how that goes. I'm not fussing with images - I'm satisfied with getting titles and links transferred at this stage of my learning.

I'll want to add an avatar; people use Gravatars now so I will be looking into that. And then there are the many handy-dandy widgets out there to learn more about.

My personal niche for writing has evolved to more of a focus on local events; I'll be keeping that new focus in mind as I work to improve my blog both for appearance and functionality.

Looking ahead

I'm quite in awe of what some people have accomplished with their blogs. At this time I have only a glimmer of intent and purpose in my mind's eye for my blog, but it is at least a glimmer that I believe will grow brighter in the next few months. I added this tagline to the title of my blog: "If you don't start - you'll never arrive."

Today I am giving thanks for my blog, "A Page for a Sage," and that I have actually made a start toward accomplishing something that I felt should be within my reach, but was evading my grasp. Because I started, I now have an opportunity to arrive at whatever "blog destination" I carve out for myself in the months to come.

The following words were chosen by my spouse as an epithet: "Life Was Good, I Was Blessed."

Not only am I giving thanks today for having a working blog, as elementary as it may be, but I am giving thanks that I have the computer capability to achieve that. Life is good, and I am blessed, indeed!

Giving Thanks for My Online Writing Career
Giving Thanks for These Primary Senses: Sight, Hearing, Touch, Smell and Taste

Sources: Personal experience, and Ephesians 5:20
A Page for a Sage