Apologies galore

I caught myself, so you don't have to

Damn it, I keep kicking myself in the butt for promising to post regularly and then sitting around for months complaining about having no time, or writer’s block. Now I have a backlog of stuff I want to write about, and a lot of stuff I wrote in my morning pages and never turned into an article.

One thing that blocks me is using my real name and gushing with ideas and opinions that could get me into real trouble, like ICE-breaking-down-front-door kind of trouble.

SO, I’ll change my name, and/or the name of this publication (“Strange Soup” is more than enough without “Ed’s Words” and probably easier to find, but I need to make sure I don’t lose any of my followers and subscribers to the vagaries of server software. I’ll send out a warning when I make any changes, and hope you will comment if there’s any problems at your end.

I’ll also announce my rules about paid subscriptions. That will apply only to a different publication (this one will always be free, and will continue to feature my essays, opinions, memories and other relatively short contributions (i.e., no novel-length stuff). The other, non-free publication will contain fiction that I would otherwise publish as an actual paper book or ebook. The money will help pay for production costs and, well, food. But that will come later, after the renaming is complete.

It’s still free. I’m too lazy to figure out how to
do the money thing.

I’m a bit concerned about the relative lack of comments so far. I think I have a surprising amount of subscribers given that I don’t offer perks, advertising, or anything else. I also don’t restack anyone’s contributions, but it’s nothing personal. If I like something you wrote, I’ll like it or reply to it. It’s just that when I look at other writers’ posts, It takes a lot of scrolling to get past the restacks into the original content, and tells me what you liked, as opposed to who you are. You probably like a lot of content that doesn’t conform to your core beliefs, like I do. I like posts that obviously involved a lot of loving effort, originality, and skill, whether or not I agree to the poster’s overall frame of mind. I’m not a MAGA or a bigot, but I don’t want to encourage that or be associated with it. If I like a post, that’s my opinion of that post only, not the overall content of that user. I just look at whatever the algorithm gave me in the initial stream, and comment or like.

I find it frustrating when I’d love to write a constructive comment, but blocked by a paywall. I’ll make the entire submission viewable to paid subscribers only, rather than tease with a preview and not allow non or free subscribers to give me feedback.

I’ll block indiscriminate haters, but not genuine criticism.

And I’m reluctant to “follow back” or take out subscriptions from readers who don’t want to share their original content or just want to flirt and show off their bodies. Or accumulate friends, like on Facebook, just to break some kind of record or compete with people for attention.

Sorry about the overall tone of this post, but I want you to know who I am, and whose contents I enjoy reading. So, I’ll experiment with a bit of anonymity, SEO, and income, always bearing in mind that I appreciate my free readers and don’t want to lose them.

I hope that button works. I’m relatively new to Substack myself.