“They were linked by the usual shared enthusiasms to which lovers give exaggerated importance: a fondness for Vivaldi and the Beatles.” Christopher J. Koch, The Year of Living Dangerously
I’ve learned two things in my first year of producing JOY Journal. One, I enjoy interacting with other creatives — even if it is digitally. Two, the blogiverse is a great place for a writer to play.
The first awareness needs no explanation. Just a thank you to readers and friends, both those whom I knew in the real world before I started JOY Journal and those whose hearts I have come to enjoy solely on the screen.
The second realization, every writerly blogger already knows. Blogging offers a freedom of expression that no other venue can.
For example, real journalism is limited to truth, or at least truth as it can be documented.
And, books. Books! Everything in that arena is tied to publisher risk and author platform and money. It’s a PewDiePie world, God help us.
But, ah, blogging. It’s a venue that’s ever sculptable, never gated. It’s raw. It’s real and unreal, whichever you want. It’s professional and novice and everything in between, wherever you are. It’s voices and accents and ways of thinking that are rarely heard.
It’s democracy, and I love it. So, here’s to a second year.
Nora Edinger -- JOY Journal 
Cheers to you and another year of blogging! I have been blogging for about 5 years I think, I can’t remember, I’ve changed it and the names so many times. At any rate, I enjoy blogging as well, I love meeting new people from all over the world, and I hope that my blogging benefits someone out there! Even if I never make any money from it, if I help one person, it’s been worth it to me. It is also rather therapeutic, don’t you think?
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Thank you! On therapy — probably. Like kneading bread and chopping wood, just not as exerting. 🙂
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👏👏👏👏👏👏 Blog away! I am enjoying your adventure!
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🙂 Thanks, Julie!
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Congratulations! It is fun to follow blogs. I am an accidental blogger, it was too hard to get my ideas published so my friend coached me through setting up wordpress and I am having fun “publishing” on my own!
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Thanks! You certainly do a wonderful job of it. I love the art you make. It’s so cheery! (I like publishing on my own, too!)
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True dat! 💟
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🙂
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I’m enjoying your adventure and have loved catching up with you again.
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Me, too!
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Congratulations and wish you many more successful milestones. Definitely, its a wonderful n unique venue of freedom of expression which u have utilised so well. Excellently written. Cheers! 💐💐💐
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Thank you! I enjoy your work, as well.
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Congratulations! You use your freedom and talents well!
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🙂 Thanks! Sorry so slow to respond. You got caught in my spam filter. Have a blessed weekend.
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You too!
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