Blogging platform # 16- Listicles ( list articles) yes or no?

I think I was rather naughty, but sometimes very nice. I hope someone at least checked the list.

I write lists for groceries. This is not a blogging issue. It’s a “remembering all those little things” issue. I used to think I could remember everything, but the truth is, I never remembered everything. Sometimes I’d forgot one not-very-important item and sometimes, I’d forget the ONE important item. I never remembered the forgotten thing until I was in the car, on my way home. Sometimes, it was critical enough — the main part of dinner — that I had to go back. Usually, I redesigned what I was cooking because nothing would get me back into the store a second time. Once was plenty.

These days when I see a long “listing” post, I think groceries rather than blogging. It’s not that I have anything against lists. They are usually easy, though the ones that go on and on for as many as 40 or 50 questions can be a bit tedious — and repetitive. I think I had more fun with this kind of thing when I was newer to blogging than now. When we were younger and still playing “let’s get to know each other.” Now, we know each other.

At this point, I think anyone who wants to know anything about me or mine can probably find a post or three I’ve written. Sometimes I feel as if I’ve been around too long.

I do follow a few. Some because I always have followed them, others because the subject interests me or just tickled my fancy. I don’t see a lot of “list” blogs come up anymore. There used to be more, but a lot of people who wrote them are gone — retired from blogging or just gone. I miss them. They really livened up the blogger world.

I’m unlikely to answer a list that’s a “getting to know you” kind of thing because I think everyone already knows more about me than they need or want to know, but other subjects can be interesting. I’m always grateful when someone posts something like that and I have nothing going on mentally, so I am grateful to just grab onto it. Answer questions, add a few pictures, voila! A post!

Does this mean I’m not doing any “serious” writing? I’m not sure that most of us do really serious writing on our blogs. Maybe I did in years past. Or tried. These days, I’m anchored in the here and now. Someone asked about “old memory” stuff for blogging and I realized I’m not eager to dig into things that happened 50 years ago. The world is different and comparison is meaningless.

Telling young people how “it used to be” is balderdash. It sounds stupid, stilted and fake. What was true long decades ago isn’t true now and I doubt will ever be again. I’m not even sure it was true when it happened and certainly not as we remember it. I have the distinct impression that most of us were fooled into thinking the world was what we wanted it to be, not the one in which we live. We weren’t paying the right kind of attention.

So I’ll list things, but they are going to be “now” things, not “then” things. Also, I can’t actually remember a lot of the things that happened a long time ago. It WAS a long time ago. I’m having enough trouble keeping track of stuff going on right now.

Categories: #black-&-white-photography, #Blogging, #Photography, Anecdote, History, old photograph, Remembering - Memories

Tags: #BloggingPlatform, #Photography, memories, the old days