Yes, I am alive and well (according to some people, definitely not my doctors though) and so is this site! Don’t let the date of my last post fool you. [Ahhh, late 2019–we were just babies then.] This blog was not a casualty of the pandemic; I just abandoned it for other, non virus-related reasons. We won’t get into it now; I’m sure it’ll come up.

But now I’m here and you’re here, so let’s talk! I expect a lot of people will be reviving their old blogs now that the general landscape of social media has become kind of post-Chernobyl. I’ve certainly had my fill of Facebook, never really got into Twitter [and wouldn’t touch it with a pole of any length at this point], and I find Instagram pretty boring. But I was on TikTok, and that brings us to why we’re here now. Being a troglodytic, hipster-adjacent, “I like to hold a real book in my hand” kind of person, you might be surprised to learn that I did in fact enjoy TikTok, briefly.

I originally made an account so I could see the videos my daughter was making because she is amazing and I need more of her art and sense of beauty in my life. But I almost immediately felt the urge to create some videos myself. It irritates me when people get on a platform and lurk without ever contributing their own voice. But maybe that’s an unfair view, because not everyone likes to create. Somebody has to do the consuming, I guess.

I was not on TikTok for more than a day before I was shadow banned for acting like a bot. Of course, it took me a while to realize it, which I think is the point of shadow banning. Being brand new to this type of platform and really feeling my age these days, I wanted to find my way around and figure out how TikTok works before I connected with people I know. So I didn’t personalize my account right away. I had a silly username, a default avatar for my profile photo, and didn’t allow the app to connect me with any of my phone contacts. And because I’m a GOOD MOM, the first thing I did was to follow Eve and heart all of her posts, one after the other in rapid succession. *Apparently* this is how a shady bot behaves so TikTok banned me, kind of. I still had my account but whenever I liked a post, they would come in behind me and remove my heart. If I commented on a post, TikTok would pretend to post it but then delete it as soon as I looked away. The same thing happened when I posted my own videos. They would act like they posted it — “Your video has been posted! Share with friends?” — but then it would sit there getting zero views and when Eve looked at my profile she said I had no videos posted.

I finally figured out what happened and instead of waiting the three weeks it takes to get un-shadow-banned, I made a new account. Real name, real face, added all my contacts. Then I gingerly scrolled and oh so occasionally liked a post and tried my best to act as much like a real human person as I could. All very good and normal over here.

I was on TikTok for a few months before it was banned in the US. Yes okay, it came miraculously back to life Lazarus style after like 12 hours, but still. I was–as the kids were saying five years ago–shook. After finally finding a platform that was more good than bad, it was upsetting to lose it in a day. TikTok is fun, and it’s easy to find people who uplift you and make the world seem less terrible there. I can share my creations with a lot more people than ever see my posts on Facebook or Instagram. But realizing that these platforms are flawed and tenuous, I really wanted to connect with the world and share part of myself in a place that I could control and that wouldn’t be shut down on a whim. Unless, of course, that whim was my own (looking at you, last post from 2019).

So that’s what brought me back to blogging. Riveting, I know! Thanks for being here with me.

My first post back, I want to share an art project! I made a little zine, something I had been wanting to do for ages. Now that it’s done, I can see some things I’d want to do differently next time. But I think it’s pretty cute and I’m happy that I finally made one. And now that I broke the curse, I can embrace my fear of failure and make hundreds more.