Every morning I get up early and read blogs. I read about 20 or so a day—some are friends, some are discoveries I've made throughout the year, some through twitter. With coffee in hand, I read and/or comment. Comments are important, are they not? It's nice to see clicks but for me, writing is all about connection and the comments? Well those are the conversations that connect. But that's a whole other post for a whole other time.
After I read and comment I go over to my Speed Skating Mom blog and check my stats. I like to see where and how people are coming to visit me. Yesterday I saw someone had come in from Late Night Plays written by Louise Gleeson. I went to visit and saw where the person had come from. It was her post A Wish For Me, From You. I am bullet point number three.
The story behind the story is that Louise once applied for a job with YMC. I liked her immediately. She is a talented writer who's intelligent but also funny and down the earth–-we got along from the get-go. For the record she also has a ridiculously sexy voice. She didn't get the job but we did email back and forth a few times. I remember telling her she didn't need luck, and she doesn't because the woman is talented. I could learn a thing or two from her.
While I remember the telling, I didn't think anything about it on my end. It was a statement of fact and yet...those words had impact. Enough that she chose to write about them months later. Reading what she wrote was the best way I could start 2012.
Then a little later on in the day, I tweeted out my Recycle Your Holiday Craft Cards post saying "Look! I can do crafty shit!"
Someone responded letting me know that my use of curse words was "tres classy."
I get that my cursing may be offensive to some people and I'm completely okay with losing followers on twitter or someone choosing not to read my blog because of the swear words, but the sarcastic "tres classy" remark? That hurt me. It was a remark that wasn't meant in a nice way no matter how you read it. My heart sank. When I told my husband about it I had tears in my eyes.
A few hours after reading words that brought me up, I read words that brought me down.
When we're out there in real life, we often don't put weight in our words. When we're behind our screens on the internet, even less so; it's easy to say things maybe we wouldn't say face-to-face in real life. The words you put out there have meaning, they are like squeezing toothpaste from a tube, once they are out it's almost impossible to put them back in.
Yesterday may have been a day with ups and downs but for me it reinforced the lesson that words have power.
Let this be the year that we think before we type. Be the example. Let your words raise people up.
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