BLOGGER NIRVANA NUMBERS REACH ONE

The biggest number in Blogger Nirvana? The number one.

The comparisons are endless:

You’re not a runner if you don’t run.

You’re not a walker if you don’t walk.

You’re not a student if you don’t study.

Not a rocker if you don’t rock.

Agreed?

And you’re not a writer if you don’t write.

For a blog like BoomerPdx, the online equivalent to Slow TV, where you find feelings about things you never had before, writing is key.

So is finding an audience, which makes me wonder why BoomerPdx isn’t big in Scandinavia, but that’s another post.

Last night in my new favorite place, Tigard’s Tapphoria, I met an actual blog subscriber to this blog.

Like every good blogger, I asked what would make BoomerPdx better. That’s when we got into the Slow TV conversation.

He said to take a look at atavist.com, which I did, or The Atavist Magazine.

It felt like blogger nirvana.

It was a big night for the Old Blog Coach, hearing good advice in between beer suggestions from a man who spent two years as a ‘defense contractor’ who spoke Arabic and said he passed as Lebanese when he had to.

He was so real I didn’t ask much more about the work besides saying, “Like Blackwater?”

“Close enough,” he said.

On the other side a man showed off an old tattoo from his active duty days in the Special Forces side of the military. I liked the ink, a caduceus, or two snakes around a winged staff.

That’ll be my next tattoo, which would be my first.

He was a licensed gun dealer.

“Are you packing heat?” I asked.

“In my car.”

When he showed his tattoo I pretended he was going for his gun. We all laughed. Heh. Heh.

A band of brothers at a local tap house got me thinking about the audience and who one really writes for?

Hint: It’s not the whole world waiting for anyone’s next post, let alone mine. Or yours.

One is the answer. It’s been said before. Some writers see themselves as their audience, as The One.

And they’re wrong.

Pick one person and write to them, for them, about them. Just don’t tell them. Nothing ruins universal appeal faster than spilling those beans.

If someone asks if they were an inspiration, go ahead and tell them.

One is the answer, not two, three, or a billion for blogger nirvana.

It’s not the same audience you found with a series of posts, either. People have lives to live and move on after the first blush with a viral post.

Three Dog Night had it right with one of their hits:

One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do
Two can be as bad as one
It’s the loneliest number since the number one…

One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do
One is the loneliest
One is the loneliest
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do

Yes, one might be the loneliest number, but that’s the challenge, expanding outward from there.

One makes a good start.

Take yourself out of the mix because two can be as lonely as one. Now you’re on the right track.

Take a second to ask yourself, “Who do I write for?”

Is it an idealized person, a real person, your editor, your agent?

Or is it a subscriber you met over a beer?

Reaching blogger nirvana is tricky.

Pick the wrong one and watch things slide:

It’s just no good anymore since you went away (number)
One is the loneliest (number)
One is the loneliest (number)
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do (number)
One is the loneliest (number)
One is the loneliest (number)
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do (number)
One (one is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do)(number)
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do (number)
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do

If you’re looking for The One, that one, the one who pushes your fingers as much as your brain when you place your hands on a keyboard, think local.

For instance, if you met a high school classmate at Safeway, and you didn’t know they lived nearby, they could be The One.

Shared roots makes a difference. Exploring how lives take off in different directions is fertile blogging ground.

Or you could hold an image of a past flame in your mind and post on the regret and remorse of love lost.

Before you get caught up in nostalgia and contact them on facebook, read the above sentence about quietly going about your blogging business.

What could happen if you gush to them about how significant they were in your life, and how you’d love them to stop by your house to meet your wife and kids?

“Really? You think that’s a good idea, your kids meeting who their momma could have been?”

You could use someone you admire for inspiration; if you tell them your plan and be ready for the stalker talk.

One is the number, writer, choose carefully.