Mrs. McFeely's Weekly Squeeze

Edit: Note added below...

I've really got to step up this Weekly Squeeze business. Because we've got somewhere over 80 links now, I think, and if I keep doing Love-In profile posts (squeezes. And yes, these would be butt squeezes. I'm dirty that way, with people I like) at a rate of one per week, with random weeks taken off for travelling and wallowing in existential despair, it will take years to profile them all. Years. And by then you will all have tired of me, or of blogging, or both, and then my squeezes will fall on numb butts and then where will we be?

(OK, dropping tired references to asses. But I grew tired of writing about penises. And asses are just around the corner, and, so, easy to find.)

(STOPPING NOW.)

(Really.)

(Hey. Wanna see a penis-sized carrot?)



I am so tired. I cannot be held accountable for what I write today. Do not operate heavy machinery; do not blog.

(Must blog! Am Mrs. McFeely! And am falling behind on my squeezes!)

Where was I? Right - you all might tire of me (do I never stop talking about me?) or of blogging. Which brings me to today's squeeze: Beanie Baby's wonderful embrace of her favorite bloggers. Which came with a twist: she wrote it while feeling deeply ambivalent about blogging and bloggers. While thinking through her concerns about blog politics.

Which is very much in the air these days, and seems to have been for some time. Kristen wrote a thought-provoking post yesterday, in response to an excellent post by Izzy, about the pressures of blog social norms and, in particular, comment etiquette. Scarbie wrote last month about her frustration at not being able to - and not really wanting to - keep up with the seeming demands of blog socializing, demands that sometimes seem necessary if one is keep one's blog in the social stream. And many others have been murmuring their own frustrations: cliquey, exclusive, demanding. (Those of you who have written about this, could you leave links to your posts in the comments? I've read some really good ones in the last month or two but can't remember, in my current fog of exhaustion, where I read them. Terrible, I know, forgive me - but if you send me the links I'll update this post with those links.)

Enter Beanie Baby. She had been, she tells us, feeling out of sorts about the politics of blogging:

“Popularity. Who would have thought it still had currency among thirty-something mothers, especially thirty-something mothers who don't even know each other? The whole thing has been getting me down lately, and I've tried--and failed--to write posts about it on three separate occasions.”

But in lieu of her 'blog politics' post, she jumped in on the Love-In, and positioned her thoughts on such politics as a segue to an ode to bloggers she likes. Kim, Tanya, Moreena, Mystery Mommy, Jen/MUBAR, Marla, Dani, Jen/Under the Ponderosas, Casey, Yankee Transplant and Running 2Ks, were and are, for Beanie Baby (and anyone who reads them) antidotes to blog politics. Bloggers that, for one or two or six reasons or another, have given her something worth coming back for. Warmth, good humour, intelligence. Friendship, real and virtual.

Which was the whole point of this whole Love-In thing. Bring y'all everybody all together. Feel the love. Let the sun shine.

(WARNING: navel gazing ahead.)

But I have to admit, when I saw Scarbie's post, I thought, oh god she's talking about bloggers like me. And when I saw Beanie Baby's - same thing. I am freakishly rah-rah about mommy blogging. I am the ultimate uncool blogger.

Am I - I thought - the Tracy Flick of mommy bloggers? C'mon everybody - I have an excellent activity. Sign up here! I'll make the banners! (Like me like me like me!)

I worried about this for a while. And when I thought about opening up the basement, I worried some more. They will think that I am a shameless popularity whore.

But then I go back to Beanie's post, and read again about how much she likes her blogger friends. And see again how happily she embraced embracing them, and how that embrace really is an antidote to blog politics. And I feel a bit better.

I do want to be liked. (Oh god do I.) I love that people other than my husband and mother read this blog. But I don't do stuff like this to be liked. Not entirely. I do it because I like you. And because I want to make as much space as possible for these friendships. Because I want to keep these friendships alive - those that I participate in, and those that I don't. Because after more than a decade of seeing/experiencing/studying the failings of community and politics, I'm experiencing a community that is mostly successful. Not perfect. But pretty good.

I don't want to be president of that community. I don't need to be CHBM Member of the Week (seriously, what with all of the Meryl Streeps that are always nominated, it's an honour to ever make it onto the list). I don't need Andrew Shue to read my blog (Hammer, yes. Billy? Eh.) But I do want to be an antidote to blog politics. And I want to be one of many.

WonderBaby: Making Her Bad Mother Too Tired For Tomorrow Today

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BTW, anyone know how to get a sidebar back up on the, um, SIDE? My sidebar seems to be down around my bloggy ankles and it's a bit awkward...

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NOTE: There's another guest in the basement today. Please stop by, pull up a pillow or beanbag chair, pour yourself a drink and have chat with her.