This is where all the action went down for me this year. Don’t be jealous; I know, the atmosphere is pure aesthetic genius.
About a week and a half ago, all the people in the world I love descended on Chicago. Okay, this may be a slight exaggeration. There were still a few people who didn’t go who are sort-of important to me…like my husband, kids, and such. But everyone else was at the incrediblyhugefabulousamazing BlogHer conference. And I couldn’t go.
So there was pouting. There were tears. There was grouchiness, and there may have even been a little guilt-tripping-my-husband-because-I-had-to-miss-out-on-going. Put it this way–he will be making the reservation for me next year. He so enjoyed dealing with my joyful self while I stayed behind.
I saw the updates, the pics, the celebrations online. I pouted more, posting some dramatically sad comments of woe and begged people to feel sorry for me. It was truly the end of the world in classic third world style.
But then something weird happened. Really weird. I found myself having fun in spite of myself. Despite the tragic circumstances, some happy things managed to sneak their way into those few days.
It started Thursday night when I met a bestie bloggy friend for a drink at 9:30pm. Granted, we live hundreds of miles apart, so it was only a virtual meeting, but the wine was still yummy and the company was so fine. And what was meant to be a soothe-our-woes pity party ended up being The Party. It was just darn fun, and cheers to you, love!
The next day there was a whole lot of link-up love getting thrown around over the interwebs between us homebound homies. Sure, we were missing the most awesome networking opportunity of the year, but we managed to get some connections happening on the homefront. Since I’m always jonesing for Facebook followers (yes, this is a shameless plug–please, please, please follow me if you don’t and help me be less loser-like), this was pretty neat for me.
Even weirder, later on in the day, I found myself at my first in-person pitch meeting, and it went super-well. Gathering up my balls and going for it felt freakin’ amazing. I rode the pride wave through the trauma of having to drag my kids with me to the meeting and felt pretty boss afterward.
Then things got completely crazy. The savvy cool Jenn of Something Clever 2.0 and Sarah of The Sadder But Wiser Girl organized a Twitter party for Friday night. What the heck is a Twitter party? Exactly. And staying up until the start time of 10pm? Dream on…literally, because this was not happening.
But then…it did. My husband was camping out in the tent with my son that night, and I decided to use the alone time to catch up on blogging stuff. I ended up staying on the computer late and somehow…10pm and the #HomeCon13 Twitter party rolled around.
Source
What DID NOT happen this year. Yes, I’ve already created a separate e-mail folder for BlogHer ’14. #keepthedreamalive
I had a blast! These ladies were hysterical and being connected with these other gals was too much fun. Shock the crap out of me! I had just enjoyed a late-night Twitter party.
Saturday, I got sick. Really sick. So this wasn’t so great, but hey, it can’t all be sunshine and roses, right? Unless I was in Chicago–then it would have been nothing but rainbows, I’m sure.
BUT…had I been in Chicago, there would have been no cool pseudo wine date or virtual connecting (let’s not take this opportunity to point out that I would have had countless in-person wine dates and networking opps), no forcing myself out of my comfort zone to pimp my business, and no Twitter party. When all was said and done, I had new experiences, grew, and had fun. So really, it was the same as being at BlogHer right??
Yeah…so next year, just count me in for the conference. Will be easier than trying to justify why not going didn’t suck.
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