So Last November, I wrote a blog post titled “20 Things No One Told You About Moving Overseas“, while determined for the twentieth time to maintain a regular blogging regiment. That post had the highest number of readers ever, somewhere around 130 views. I was ecstatic. Then, a short time later, life got in the way for the 21st time, and I shelved blogging. Again. Not intentionally, life just moves fast here. I blame the tropical weather. The weather is the same today as it was six months ago, but my brain tells me, “well….it’s hot and sunny now, and it was hot and sunny the last time you wrote, so it must have been a month or so ago.” Or maybe I’m just lazy.

When we visited the United States a few months ago for the first time in over two years, I was told repeatedly by friends, “we love reading your blog!” Wow, someone was reading?! They were clearly part of the 10 readers I had on most posts. Now, I don’t base my blogging on the number of readers, I do it more to just kind of keep track of life here, and share it with those interested, but it did ignite a little something. I came back determined, for the 21st time, to keep up this time around. One month in, so far, so good.

My first couple posts back maintained the usual 10-20 hits, no biggie. Then, something weird happened. August 1, on a whim, a decided to check stats for the last post. I noticed that the “20 Things” post suddenly jumped to over 500 views for that day. I assumed it was a system glitch. The next few days, the numbers continued to climb, and the comments started to roll in. I realized this was no glitch. There was one viewing July 31. That person obviously shared it, and well, it went viral. OK, maybe not viral, it’s more like a case of the sniffles, but as of today, it has been viewed over 62,000 times.

Wordpress.com’s map of views, I love maps!

It has been viewed in over 170 countries on six continents. If I could only get those darn penguins in Antarctica to log on…I was a Geography major in college, and I honestly didn’t know there were 170 countries. It has been tweeted, shared on Facebook, pinned on Pinterest, reblogged, and shared on a handful of other websites. It has found it’s way “back” to me at least four times through friends here who have had it forwarded to them from around the world. We’ve made a handful of new “friends” and acquaintances who have emailed or commented saying, “You read my mind! Thank you!”. Thanks in return for reading and sharing! I know many bloggers and websites would sneer and pat me on the head saying “how adorable are you” for getting excited about such a “small” number, but it’s all relative. No, it’s not up to the levels of the ice bucket challenge, or a skydiving cat, or so-and-so’s latest haircut, and I’m sure in a short time, I will go back to just a handful or readers, or maybe not. Either way, it’s been a ridiculously fun ride.

Can I give some (probably unsolicited) advice? Now that I’m a internationally known writer and all? (Ha!) If you blog, and have low numbers, keep writing. Not for anyone else, but for you. During the last few weeks, I went back and skimmed old blog posts. It was awesome. It was fun to see how we’ve changed, and how we’re still the same. Events I had forgotten, perspectives that have changed, it’s all there, saved in a server somewhere, waiting to be pulled up at a moment’s notice. It was like going through an old photo album or yearbook. And, you never know who, of those five people who stumble on a post, will be the one who really needed to read it. And if by chance, one of them forwards it to the right arena, and it gets spread around the world, enjoy your 15 minutes of fame! And try not to forget us little people.