Recently I had the opportunity to attend HoCo Blogs’ “Blogging and Social Media” with many other awesome Howard County bloggers – and lots of people from other towns, states, and even one person from another country! It was an incredible experience, and it was so fun connecting with other bloggers, including Jessie, Elizabeth, and Eric, and of course, David. David Hobby is a Howard County blogger – like myself and 400-something other people – and the author of Strobist, an unbelievable stack of knowledge that contains the next 178 hours of your life (seriously – I have spent so many hours reading David’s blog). I have learned so much from Strobist, so I was thrilled to attend his presentation with HoCo Blogs.
During the presentation, David shared his journey to and through blogging. He also shared social media techniques he has tried, and then we had the chance to workshop a local business and improve their social media (which was a fun test case). I was a bit starstruck at the onset of the presentation, and I think part of it was because everyone was – there was an energy – a reverence maybe – in the room when the presentation started. But not long after David began his presentation, he stopped us and told us that we not need to write gratuitous notes just for his sake (“slide of tree, taken with iPhone”) and that nervous energy seemed to disapate with each joke after. Because to be quite honest with you, David is an extremely funny and personable guy – much more so than I expected. That is not to say he doesn’t seem that way on his blog – he is extremely witty. But I was very surprised by how down to earth and “real” David was. But maybe that fundamentally goes back to why he started Strobist. David mentioned that he began Strobist as a way to provide his advice and knowledge for those “behind” him. I thought this was a nice way of putting it. It reminded me of a path; we are all on this path, but some of us have passed landmarks that others have not yet, and David is sharing tips for those of us coming up on those.
After the presentation, I called my mom to reiterate all my new knowledge and ideas, and she stopped me. “David Hobby… that name sounds so familiar,” she said.
“Of course! He’s Strobist!”
“What is a Strobist?” She asked – then before I had a chance to answer: “Oh, I think I worked with him on the Sun.”
And of course she was right (mothers somehow always are). It turns out my mother, who used to write for the Baltimore Sun, has worked with David Hobby, who used to work for the Sun as well. They would meet up for articles, my mother to interview the interesting parties, and David to photograph them. It feels pretty ironic that the blogger I have read for years is someone my mom used to work with. On top of that, David used to teach at the college I teach at; in fact, he said many of the ideas for Strobist were inspired during that time period. It is just a reminder of what a small, closely woven community Howard County is – and we are so fortunate to be even more greatly connected by the community we have with HoCo Blogs.
I left the conversation – because it was much more so a conversation than a one-sided presentation – inspired and excited. I was excited about my blog and energized about my photography – and a lot of other people in that room were also. I am ready to implement tips and techniques that David shared, and I am excited to continue looking towards the future. I feel empowered and even more so, I feel that my blogging has been reaffirmed. I began blogging at Babbling Brooke over five years ago – I am basically an “old blogger” at this point – but along the way, I lost a lot of what I loved about blogging, and there was one big, huge reason: I began to care too much. As my blog grew and my audience expanded, I became overwhelmingly aware of that audience – to the point that I went back and deleted portions of posts. In the first few years of my blogging life, that never happened – I wrote what I wanted, and I put myself out there. I was honest, and I was genuine. I shared stories of my life freely. But a shift happened and slowly I began caring too much – and my writing and creativity dwindled. I started writing less and less, and including few details of “me” in my posts. My most important takeaway today is to return to that blogger that I was – one that wrote what she felt, thought, and meant – and one of my big goals is to return to that authentic blogger and to write without inhibitions.
Thank you so much to Jessie Newburn, half of the team behind HoCo Blogs, for organizing this great event, and thank you to David Hobby for being so open and generous with what he has learned. This was an incredible event!
Me and David Hobby. I am still recovering from my wisdom teeth removal, hence the puffy face.
David and Jessie, longtime friends, former neighbors and cat-neighbors, and fellow Howard County Bloggers.
Bloggers waiting for the presentation to begin.
Howard County bloggers.
