five years of living, laughing and blogging
in the early spring months of 2020, i began half-jokingly tweeting about my goal of becoming a "lifestyle blogger". it was impulsive, public, and - i think those who were around to witness my process would agree - pretty funny performance art.
i learned a lot through that performance: i hired professional designers for the initial brand, and i even hosted a virtual conference to celebrate the launch - this was my first ever non-work livestream, by the way, and we raised over $10,000 for the women's prison association. live laugh blog was an important vehicle for me to face my workaholism during its peak and learn to step away from the "bad screen" and, sometimes quite literally, touch some grass.
and it was five years ago, today, when i published the first post. not everything has changed; i'm still sober, surrounded by art supplies, computers and paper, and (as far as i can tell from ground level) my mom is still where i found her. but a lot has. the world, unsurprisingly, got more cruel and disturbing. i worked myself into a series of autoimmune disorders as my job went through an acquisition. i leveled up in my hobbies, quit twitter, became a karaoke professional, fell in love with melting wax, and lost a lot of hair but then grew it back grayer. after a couple of years, during which i learned and grew a lot more than i can tell a lot of people on this bitch of a planet have, i left corporate to take a break and recalibrate my physical and mental states before figuring out what was next. through this blog, i took you - jenn nation on my journey.
and here we are today, reflecting on 5 years during which i made a series of wild, crazy and risky decisions that have given me some clarity on my path for the next five. i think i've done a really good fucking job - and i'm not even close to being done! i don't know if it's the root canal retreatment i got last week finally healing, or a bud telling me last night that the candle i gave him was "by far the nicest smelling thing in [his] house", but i'm feeling energized about what's next and how i get to continue sharing it with you here on live laugh blog.
one thing that's next is launching bugs rock, another venture that started as a half-joke (quitting tech to become a candlemaker) and is becoming a reality through my hard work and the support of so many cool and creative people on the internet and in my offline life. i started an llc, poured a lot of wax, did a lot of science, shipped and gave out candles to friends to prepare me for the "real thing".
while i was planning to open the shop today, dental work and glitch winding down got a bit in the way. and to be completely honest, it's been hard to not feel frustrated and defeated over not making this deadline. but then as i was headed to aerial yoga on thursday night, i reminded myself that i didn't quit my job to learn how to run a candle business, i quit my job to learn to fucking relax and be kind to myself. so instead of rushing into this new thing that's higher stakes than a blog, as it involves fire and money, i'm going to use today as a launch to me more openly sharing the process, launch and celebration in real time - just like i did with this blog when i started working on it in 2020.
i appreciate you for joining me, reading my words, looking at my photos, and - in probably just a week or two - buying my candles. 🕯️
xoxo jenn
p.s. i looked for photos i took on may 31, 2020, to share in here but it was only screenshots of me arguing with dudes on twitter and photos of typical carnage from pumagreg aka "lil shredder". i'm blessed to only have to deal with the latter these days.
p.p.s. i hope you like the new template/design of the blog for this year. if not, don't tell me unless something is actually broken!