I went to Texas as a guest of poetry festivals in April 2006. The person who instigated this told me I should do a blog. I didn’t have a clue how! But I met poets there who had blogs, and after I got back I asked one how to go about it, he introduced me to Blogger and I began recording the Texas trip from the emails I’d sent home, which my husband had circulated among friends, and adding some of the many photos from the journey. Then a muso I met there (who actually lives in Scotland) emailed me to say I could hear his music on MySpace, so I joined it just for that. He said it was mostly for musos, but he didn’t see why a poet shouldn’t network there too.

Cutting long story just a teeny bit shorter, I fell madly in love with MySpace - on which there are hundreds of poets, many of them wonderful, and where I also met vibrant and brilliant older women and fascinating, original young people who sought me out even though (or because?) I am an older woman. After a while people started asking me to mentor them in energy work – because I am a Reiki Master, psychic reader, and (sssh!) witch – so I set up a special MySpace profile for that purpose, in addition to my personal profile.

Next I found the goal-setting site, and community, 43 Things; I forget how. Seemed like a good idea but I didn’t make it work for me. The only goal I ever kept was the quirky thing some people there were doing: writing haiku on Friday. I opted out of 43 Things but missed that, so I set up a MySpace profile called Haiku on Friday, on which lots of other people now come and play every week.

A MySpace friend recommended Writer’s Resource Center where John Hewitt was running a 30 Poems in 30 Days project. I joined in, so did others including a terrific poet who called herself The Cerebral Mum. We liked each other’s work, became friends, but she had trouble accessing my MySpace blogs, so I started doing new posts on my Blogger blog just for her. It all grew, and I’ve ended up separating the Texas trip from my other blogging. Ah, the poor Texas trip! Two years later, the recording happens VERY slowly; I’m still only half way through April 2006. Never mind, it’s mainly just for me.

After publishing a few of my poems on MySpace and then on my Blogger blog, I eventually decided to make a poetry blog, and to put it on Blogger on the theory it’s easier for people to access. Then a friend asked me to make a blog just for my own haiku, out here rather than on MySpace, so I did that too. At first I created a separate profile for the poetry blogs, then I thought that was silly and attached them to my original Blogger profile.

My husband wanted a website to publicise our books and other things we do. After some abortive starts with web designers who - strangely! - didn’t want to put in long hours without decent recompense, I got the idea of creating it by blogging. So I did. Actually a nest of 6 blogs at a new Blogger profile. We love it!

Somewhere along the way I tried Facebook because someone invited me, and very soon learned to loathe it, so I’m not there any more. I also tried Twitter because it seemed a great way to keep up with some far-flung pals who didn’t communicate very often, and with another who was travelling awhile. I do it from computer, not phone, and I never ‘follow’ strangers even if they (mysteriously!) decide to follow me. I like Twitter, but only in the way I use it.

I still love MySpace, where I have LOTS more readers than in this place I call ‘out here’. But I am having great fun out here too, finding new blogs to enjoy, such as this one. And now that The Cerebral Mum has introduced me to Aussie Bloggers, my world has expanded even more! I don’t see it ever contracting backwards again.