jennadianne

I’ve been here before.

As I aimlessly scroll and swipe on my phone I realize all of these posts I have seen before. Not necessarily literally but figuratively.

I wish I kept better notes in my past but once upon a time I was trying to be involved in the online book community. Before BookTok there was Booktube. Bookstagram emerged eventually but it was it was mostly bookish content on YouTube and blogs. Looking at my Goodreads I’d say as far back as 2012. (I’m fucking old)

I bought the physical books, because it was not considered “cool” to read exclusively on an ereader. I read the books. I made the videos and it just was not working. Nothing I did I felt was getting me anywhere. Music, no music. Quirkly edits and bloopers; graphics. Requesting way too much ARCs (advanced reader copies) from NetGalley. Nothing was sticking to the wall. After years of trying, I quit. I’m not proud of it because I feel like if I just stuck with it something might have happened. But I got tired of wasting my time in all ways. I got tired of reading books I was not actually enjoying. And so I stopped, just like that.

I deleted all my bookish accounts and content.

As always, in hindsight I see I probably should not have done that. My frustration in the moment than what I could possibly feel in the future.

I stepped back. Stepped waaaayyyyy back. And with that I started reading what I wanted to read again. What seemed interesting to me. I also started watching a lot more television again. During this time I also discovered how much I enjoyed moving my body and working out.

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Two years ago I was so into my Peloton workouts I decided to create a separate IG account so as to not annoy the people I knew in IRL with something they were not interested in. And much like the bookish community there are the clicks and obvious groups of friends. People with insane workout schedules and routines (aka stacks). This time around though, I’m not taking the bait. I’ve just been out here doing my own thing. Making stacks that work for me and my time and feelings. I do not feel pressured to take certain classes or hit a particular number of minutes. The badges do not do anything for me. Since this was my hobby account, I started to add bookish pages to my follow list. And I am laughing…

Kindles are cool now. Ha! They were frowned upon so many years ago. It was all about the stacks of physical books. Hardbacks were ideal, but paperbacks were acceptable. Everyone understood that hardcovers were so much more expensive. The thing to do with you Kindle is to decorate it. Popsockets and stickers galore.

It’s definitely still a thing to show off how many books you read in a month and/or year. And everyone is still reading the same thing. BOTM is a whole thing. People still hate Amazon and audible. I just saw a TikTok today from a librarian about utilizing the library more instead of buying into the consumerism of book buying.

NOTHING HAS FUCKING CHANGED. 🤣

I’m not sure if I thought something would change. I honestly do not know what I thought would happen. A lot of the accounts I did follow back then have slowed down – life happened to them.

It is hilarious to see people loving & hating Colleen Hoover (CoHo) because I was reading her books since 2014. I read Verity when it was first published in January 2019. I want to comment asking some of these creators where they’ve been and I realize, they were probably in grade school still. This is the new generation. And I was even old and in a different stage of life when I was ankles deep in the online community. So when people say history repeats itself – it sure the hell does.

I guess I am just on the internet right now to say, it’s weird. It’s really fucking weird. It definitely makes me less interested in it because I’ve seen this all before. I know how the story ends.