I’ve started and neglected many blogs in my years on the Internet. I remember the anonymity of the Tumblr days, where it felt so easy to lay bare all the raw emotions of my late teens-early 20s. It felt good to capture my heartbreak in vague metaphors. I loved posting other people’s blurry black and white photos, as if a single foggy mountain landscape could evoke the same feeling in all 400 of us who had reposted it.
I recently went back to my old Tumblr pages just for fun (and just to see if my writing withstood the test of time). It was a bit cringey, but mostly from the realization that I could once be so vulnerable to a database of strangers. It also felt like I was meeting a version of myself that I once knew but had forgotten. Someone who didn’t quite grasp all the emotions in her growing skin, but at the same time could find the exact words needed to describe those emotions.
I was very into writing poetry on a dusty vintage typewriter
The anonymity allowed me to speak freely, a concept that can be so hard to fathom in the current state of our society when it feels like everything we do and say online is open to the judgment and interpretation of our peers. It seems so hard to separate our identity (our names, faces, bodies, titles) from our personalities. And because of this, it’s doubly scary to be restarting my blog.
For the last few years, as posting and content creation became more about driving traffic and sales, I got lost. I convinced myself I should be creating a blog for my travel brand. Sharing my itineraries, listicles of fun things to do in each city, recommendations. Around me were other bloggers focused on gaining readership, climbing up the SEO ranks, and ultimately reaching the holy grail of passive income: affiliate marketing and ad display. But I found no joy in improving my numbers. I found no joy in rehashing itineraries when there were already other bloggers doing this so much better than I was (thankfully, too, because I wouldn’t be able to plan my own trips without them).
My very first travel blog, before lostwithjess, was a BlogSpot called “The Slow Miles” about my study abroad experiences in college. I documented the in-between moments. Reflections of my 19 year old self against the backdrop of foreign countries. That’s what I want this new version of lostwithjess to be: reflections. With each trip and each new destination, I have not stopped learning and growing. Even at 32. I want to write freely as a record-keeping practice for myself. A time capsule of each trip captured with photos and words. It feels kind of crazy, like taking a step back. But maybe what I’m really doing is honoring my inner child. Letting her breathe, letting her see the world through her eyes again.
