Usually I hate it when bloggers devote an entire post to speak directly to their audience. Nine times out of ten, it’s to sell something or ask for donations or beg people to share/repost their site or something equally annoying. I’ll roll my eyes and click out immediately, sighing in judgement. I’m a bit more sympathetic now as, having seen a little of the (surprisingly extensive and brutal) world of blogging, I more understand it. But still, I don’t like it.

Today, I am breaking my own rule.

Yesterday, we hit 10,000 views. To be honest, I’m not sure if in 5 months that is a huge accomplishment or a dismal failure. Also, in the spirit of full-disclosure, 10,000 views does not mean 10,000 visitors. If a person comes to the site and clicks on 5 posts, that counts as 5 views. I actually don’t know how to track how many individual people come to the site. If you do, let me know 🙂 I’m betting that most of the visitors are me and my Mom. But regardless, I am still happy about it.

I say “we” hit 10,000 views because as I’ve mentioned before, this blog has been a total group effort. If I’d only gone off my knowledge and expertise, these weekly posts would just be Word docs attached to emails that would go out to my friends and family and Wade. Maybe I’d occasionally attach a picture of the cat to jazz things up.

But I was fortunate in the fact that I had people around me who would not let myself embarrass (or age) myself like that. I, of course, could not have possibly hit this happy milestone without the help of my spectacular Social Media Marketing Team, my family and friends, bosses and co-workers, who all let me write about them and truthfully, you guys, the readers.

At the risk of sounding too sappy, I have been simply overwhelmed by the kind response and support I’ve received for this project. Currently, Not Quite a Cougar is being read by folks in 55 different countries. My mind is unclear how to wrap itself around this information. The personal messages I’ve received, the sympathetic comments, the sharing of your own stories – it’s more than I ever could have hoped for or imagined.

You know, there are a lot of times I come home and I don’t want to write. I want to have a beer and watch ‘Homicide Hunter: Lt. Joe Kenda’ but then I think of the time you all put into reading and sharing and commenting and messaging, well, that gets my ass to the computer. And then I always have so much fun with it, I wonder why I ever procrastinated in the first place.

But it’s more than that.

Writing this blog and the encouragement I’ve gotten on it, has effected my life in ways I never would have thought. If left to my own devices, I probably would have stopped trying to date, stopped trying to improve my life, stopped trying to move forward. I was so unhappy after the break-up with My Ex that I’m not sure what would have happened if I wasn’t working on this site. I probably would have sunk into a major drunken depression and Wade, Anna and Emily would have had to make up excuses for me at work so I didn’t get fired.

But instead, whenever I feel like giving up, I can almost feel you all cheering me on. Cheering me on to go on that next date, cheering me on to try to better myself, cheering me on to try to achieve that happy ending. I wish I was a good enough writer to express how that has made me feel. I can only say that’s it’s made me feel like I’m not walking through all this alone. Life is sometimes hard and you guys have shown me that we’re all in this together. We might not all be on the same path but by God, we’re all still walking.

I had wanted to do some sort of party or merchandise giveaway or something to celebrate this milestone but I didn’t get my act together what with the holidays and all. But for sure, 15,000 views, we will whoop it up.

Until then, let’s all just keep on keepin’ on.

Shameless self-promotion which goes against everything I just said above in the first paragraph: One of my goals in 2014 is to grow readership and your sharing with friends and family is so instrumental to that, so thank you for continuing to do that. And if you’d like to be notified of new posts as they are published, please enter your email on the right side of the blog to follow. Or you can ‘Like’ the Notquiteacougar.com page on Facebook. That way you can be kept up to date when my publishing is, er, unreliable.

Thank you again all. So much.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled posts.

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