Fruit of a Different Color

In an excess of willing semi-competence, many months ago I agreed to do a program for a Small Town women's group.

"You write a blog, don't you?" the program chairman asked me, with just a touch of the frantic in her voice. "Just talk about blogging."

And even though there probably are half a dozen bloggers in the group I'll be addressing, the combination of flattery (she thinks blogging is program-worthy!) and the aforementioned willing semi-competence led me to agree to do the program. Then I promptly forgot all about it.

Funny thing, though, how pages keep flying off the calendar like the transition animation in an old movie, and that program is getting closer and closer every day. I'm finally beginning to think about what I'm going to say, and realizing that these ladies may think they're getting an apple when they're really getting an orange. Or a kumquat, or some other fruit that bears no relation to an apple at all. In this case, the apples are the big, well-read blogs, and the other fruits are the rest of us who overcrowd cyberspace.

A comment on yesterday's post brought that back to me and made me laugh. Out loud.

Swistle is one of my favorite bloggers, and she has thousands of followers. She is raising multiple children, she is funny and outspoken, and she thinks and writes about interesting things in a way that makes me say "huh." I loved her post on Spite Charity, and when I commented on it she clicked back over to this humble corner of the internet, and brought along HUNDREDS of her readers. It was astonishing fun to watch the site meter click up and up that day.

Today Swistle commented on yesterday's post about my car's new vanity plates.

Oh, that is so fun! And what blows my mind about things like that is that 

one of your readers might actually SEE you! And be like "OMG THAT'S HER!!"

Hahahaha! What the big bloggers who routinely watch their site meters click up and up and up don't know is that we fruits of a different color usually can wave at each and every one of our readers individually. (Hi, Dad! What's up, Boys? Hey, Husband, love you!) Most of the comments we get on our posts either come from the person standing next to us in the check-out line at Wal-Mart, or during greeting time at church.

That doesn't bother me in the least--really, it frees me up to be semi-competent. I'd have to work awfully hard if this blog were one of the big ones, if it were a Pioneer Woman or Electric Boogaloo. Instead, I can write about anything that strikes my funnybone or grows in my yard or lives in my heart.

Being an apple would be fun, but I'm kind of enjoying being an orange or a kumquat. Hi, there! I'm waving at YOU!