Re-introducing myself

I think it’s time for a fresh introduction. I love reading other people’s introductory posts. They range from the basic to the esoteric, which makes them a lot of fun to spelunk through. I love Steemit because I’m meeting people all over the world and it has been a truly amazing experience so far.

Like most people, I have a difficult time talking about myself. But here goes.

Image credit: Pixabay

Me on Steemit

I’ve been on Steemit since June of 2017, which was just a little over 6 amazing months ago. If you asked me in May of 2017 whether I might soon be blogging regularly and earning money for it I would have asked what you were smoking.

I sometimes blog about what’s happening in my life. For example, I hosted the wedding of @ducksaplenty (my sister) and @preparedwombat (my brother-in-law) at my house a few months ago. There was much personal stuff, crazy stuff, going on at that time, and I wrote a little piece on the cusp of that experience called Four funerals and a wedding.

But currently most of my Steemit activity is about fiction writing.

Fiction posts and fiction workshop posts

I love fiction, and love writing short stories. I started out years ago (how many shall be my little secret) with big plans and ideas. I studied creative writing in college and graduate school, and then puttered and petered out, due to my life’s overpowering demands. But I’ve always been a reader, and have always loved studying fiction and the mechanics of great writing. The kids have all become fairly independent and now I have time. And I’m making time. In fact I began making it a priority when I found Steemit. And it turns out to be a really nice vehicle for posting short-short stories.

I’ve found Steemit fiction writing contests to be great motivators. You typically have a prompt, a word count requirement, and a pretty short deadline. The following are some of my Steemit stories, some of which were for contests and others not:

• Armistice Day, 1940 - Winona, Minnesota
• The happiness project
• The beautiful sea
• The stories we tell
• Welcome to Reality
• Refracted light
• You wish you could stop the future

Several months ago I started a fiction workshop series. This allowed me to refresh my own knowledge of creative writing principles while sharing something on Steemit that would benefit others. There is a large and growing community of fiction writers here. For example, I’m involved in The Writers’ Block which has been absolutely exploding with activity lately. You can connect up with The Writers’ Block on Discord. I was also recently inducted into the first Write Club (click the #writeclub tag in the footer for more info), which is a 16-week fiction writing boot camp with 7 other writers.

Here’s my most recent fiction workshop post, which links to all of its predecessors: Writing workshop volume 15: Three tips for improving your fiction

My Steemit Credo

I have a personal credo for what I post, resteem and comment on. It goes something like this:

• Post content that is either helpful or entertaining to others (my introduction post, notwithstanding!)
• Resteem valuable content that is useful and that I think needs some visibility.
• Never post about politics, religion or other touchy subjects that tend to be divisive or create arguments.
• Never post or comment anything inflammatory.
• Never ask for follows, resteems or upvotes; avoid self-promotion. (I'm not sure if an introduction post would be considered as such; I don't think so.)
• Always be polite, respectful, and thoughtful in comments. Help other people whenever possible. Help to make Steemit a better place.
• Ignore all spam and respond to all sincere comments in kind.
• If my posts seem like they get lost in an echo chamber sometimes, shrug it off. Be patient. Just keep doing my best to write insightful and interesting posts.

I believe that if my work was meant to be entertaining and useful, that eventually it will gain visibility. I hope Steemit continues to grow, and that everyone here with good intentions fares really well as a result.

Me professionally

I work in high tech. In practice, I manage a team of writers and write for the company blog, among other things.

Me personally

This part I’ll just tell in photo-journalism style.

I married an awesome guy 21 years ago.

Over the next few years, we had three beautiful children.

They grew and grew! We have taken many trips over the years.

I love this picture from a few years ago when we all wore silly Santa hats for our holiday picture:

And here's our most recent photo. I'm now the shortest one in the family!

All in all, I feel blessed with an awesome family, a great job, a super fulfilling hobby and all the new friends I'm making here on Steemit. I believe in this platform, and its future growth. Here's to a great future!

Thank you for taking the time to read my post!