Reflections

Wow, two posts in one day.  I'm a maniac.  This one should've been posted last week, but it's been crazy at work, so I haven't really had time to reflect on the A to Z Challenge.  Now it's too late to link at the challenge site, but I'm going to post this anyway. 
I started the challenge because my friend Sylvia over at Writing in Wonderland suggested it and I thought, hey, fun.  Why not do it? 
Who thought it would make me crazy? 
This was my first year  so I was concerned I wouldn't do it right.  I wasn't sure what a blog hop was at first.  It sounded like a dance more than a computer thing.
I would stay up late the night before, trying to get the post just right, worrying over each word so that I wouldn't say the wrong thing.  I'd be exhausted at work and still fretting over the posts.   I'd scramble trying to visit sites.  I was making myself insane trying to get to all 1700+ sites.  Then came the challenge to get over 100 followers.  I tried to figure out how to get more people to my site.  My mind was filled with all sorts of crazy notions.
Then it hit me:  I can't possibly do all this.  So, I took a different approach. I went for quality over quantity.  I didn't try to collect followers, but found sites I was interested in. I wrote my posts, kept up with the sites I could, and added a few more as time permitted. 
It started being what it was supposed to be: fun.  I posted each letter on the right day. I visited other sites.  I finished with my sanity intact. I'm still checking out other sites on the list and keeping up with those I linked to. I didn't get 100 followers, but I have more than when I started.  I have new friends to check out and I learned about all sorts of things from law, to Scandinavian culture, to writing techniques and murders. I went all over the US and the world.  It was a wild, fun ride.
Did I have some favorite places?  Sure, but to point out a few would be unfair to the others I don't have space to write about. 
This is the most important lesson I learned:  I write because I'm a writer.  I write what I'm passionate about.  If people buy it, fine, but whether or not they do, I'm still going to write.
Will I do it again?  I'm already thinking of how I can do next year different, so I guess that means I will.