It's been almost a year since I started 'The Woman Condition'. In that time I've written nearly 200 posts and the blog has hit 20,000 pageviews. This seemed like a good occasion to take a trip down blog-memory lane and write a post in which I would dust off a few of my favourite and most popular oldies.
As if the universe knew I could do with a push, one of my favourite fellow bloggers, L.G. Smith of Bards & Prophets, passed on the 7x7 Link Award to me, which asks to do exactly that: highlight older posts in the following categories:
- Most Beautiful
- Most Helpful
- Most Popular
- Most Controversial
- Most Surprisingly Successful
- Most Underrated
- Most Prideworthy
Most Beautiful
This was easy. In May I wrote a post about beauty and being beautiful, with lots of pictures of beautiful women:
They Are Beautiful and So Are You.
Most Helpful
I think the posts with most potential to be helpful are the ones in my 'So Your Partner's a Rational Creature' series. I wrote them in my first 2 weeks of blogging, so I doubt they've been read by anybody besides my family and Facebook friends, but they got a great response there and seemed to provoke both reflection and discussion.
It was interesting to read these posts again, because I can tell my style of writing has changed. Anybody who sometimes fears blogging might be a waste of time: it isn't. We practise and hone our skills, even if we're not aware of it.
So Your Partner's a Rational Creature.
Most Popular
By far the most visited posts are the 'Manage Your Body Weight - the Green Way' lot. It helped a lot that Mistress Krista of the hugely popular website Stumptuous.com gave me a shout-out, which I was very happy about, even more so because she's an absolute goddess when it comes to women's fitness and health.
Manage Your Body Weight - the Green Way.
Most Controversial
This one's more difficult. I tend to steer away from controversial posts. It's the good girl / bad girl thing, I suspect. I did plead a case for using the word 'vagina' more frequently. Where I live, that's by no means controversial, but it seems to be in other parts of the world.
Warning: Contains the Word 'Vagina'.
Most Surprisingly Successful
When I wrote my post on the art of landscape artist Andy Goldsworthy, I had never expected it to become my most visited post. It's had over 800 hits so far (most of them via Google images, I suspect). I love his work, and I suspect you might too!
Natural Beauty: the Art of Andy Goldsworthy.
Most Underrated
For reasons that are hard to define, one of my favourite posts still is 'What's Your Story?' I wrote it in January of 2011, which feels much longer ago than it is. The story (and by association the post) still moves me.
What's Your Story?
Most Prideworthy
This would have to be my very first post, because it represents a decision that took me a lot of courage: to put myself, my thoughts and my writing out there and risk the confrontation with reality - and other people.
In the beginning there was ... Eve.
Now, to pass the 7x7 Link Award on to 7 deserving friends. Like L.G., I've chosen people whose blogs have been going on for a while, but whom I've come across later. I thought this would be a great way to get to know them better as well as discover their older, legendary posts:
- Crafty Green Poet (whose blog has been alive and kicking since 2005!)
- Hart Johnson, Confessions of a Watery Tart (2009)
- Lisa Gail Green, Paranormal Point of View (2010)
- Angela Felsted, My Poetry and Prose Place (2009)
- Exmoorjane, Diary of a Desperate Exmoor Woman (2007)
- Jessica Bell, The Alliterative Allomorph (2010)
- Allison, Allison Writes (2008)
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Image: 'Forest path' by Angel Jimenez, available under a creative commons license. © 2005, Angel Jimenez.
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Congratulations on a well deserved award. I see you have passed on to two of my favourites, Crafty Green Poet and The Alliterative Allomorph.
ReplyDeleteOh thank you for thwe award! I'll need to think carefully about this one! It was interesting to read your list of posts, and I'll read the posts themselves later, when I've got more time!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for the award! :o) I really appreciate it! Hope you're having a nice weekend!
ReplyDeleteHappy to have had a chance to visit a post I otherwise wouldn't have. :)
ReplyDeleteAwwww, Thank you for including me!! That was very sweet. I normally don't do blog awards, but I might make an exception in this case because I like the focus. ;D
ReplyDeleteI knew I picked you for the award for a reason. :)
ReplyDeleteI hadn't read most of those posts, and they were wonderful. I'll have to read more about managing weight the green way. I think the planet would be better off if we all ate better/natural foods.
And 800 hits on a single post? I think I have one post with over 100.
Good job with the award. It is fun to go look through some of the old stuff again. And, btw, you snuck the word "vagina" in that Eve post too. Fair warning guys. :P
oh i'm so glad you shared this, as i know i at least rarely have time to go through the archives completely of my favorite bloggers! i read the one about managing your body weight and the whole concept of fat being stored energy and it was this massive a-ha moment for me, here i am hanging onto all this energy and why, why am i clinging to it. and it made me very emotional and it was a moment for me to think of, what am i holding onto. thank you :)
ReplyDeleteDelores: yes, they're great, aren't they. :-) So many of their posts I've missed, though. :-)
ReplyDeleteJuliet: great, I'm looking forward to your selection :-)
Jessica: thanks! Lovely weekend so far, I hope you're having a great one yourself. :-)
Suze: so glad you did, and thanks for the comment. You were the first! :-)
Lisa: perfect. :-) I'd love to see what you come up with. There are so many great posts on your blog. :-)
L.G.: =) I wasn't really annoyed with the 'extra work', I'm just not good at saying 'thank you'. ;-) Yes, Krista's shout-out did wonders. The only post that topped it was the Andy Goldsworthy one, and those are probably mostly Google image hits. Lol yes, I hadn't thought of the 'vagina' intrusion (oops, did it again) in that first post. I think at that time I wasn't aware it was a problem word in some countries. =)
EcoGrrl: thank you so much for saying that. I'm always very self-conscious about posts like those, because they're very personal and there is the possibility they're misunderstood and perceived as hurtful. In the end I push myself to write them because I think they would have helped me at specific times in my life. Thanks for letting me know they do serve a purpose!
The pictures on your beautiful women post are great, and I'm glad you shared them again.
ReplyDeleteSome of the older posts can be real gems, nice to take them out and dust them off for company.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the award, you're too kind! Can't wait to check out all the posts you linked.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great idea to mention some of your earlier posts - I'll enjoy going through them all, and checking out the other links.
ReplyDeleteTowanda: I love looking at them over and over again myself. :-)
ReplyDeleteKarenG: well said! :-)
allison: you're very welcome. I'm looking forward to reading yours as well. :-)
Rosemary: great, thank you so much. :-)
Congratulations on your award! It's great that you can look back at all your milestone posts. Well done! :)
ReplyDeleteCongratulations K.C. And thanks for passing it onto me. That was really nice of you. This is a cool award to where I can look through my posts and label them. I'll go check yours out now. :D
ReplyDeleteThis is a great idea and I loved seeing your blogs organized this way! Imitation is the best form of flattery so I may steal your idea!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Sam! :-)
ReplyDeleteAngela: I'm looking forward to seeing which ones you'll pick. There are so many to choose from. :-)
Toby: in that case, I'll cheat a bit and turn this into a 7x8 link award. Tag - you're it! :-)
Here's my response to this meme! That was fun, thanks for thinking of me! http://craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com/2011/09/7-x-7-links.html
ReplyDeleteThanks, Juliet. I enjoyed reading your posts! :-)
ReplyDelete