Last night when I went to post my Eat Pray Love piece, I had a notification waiting for me from WordPress.

“You registered on WordPress.com 4 years ago!” it said. “Thanks for flying with us. Keep up the good blogging!”

Weird airline metaphor aside, I was pleasantly surprised by this message. With everything that’s been going on in the last few weeks and months, I’d totally forgotten that it’s LGWABP’s birthday.

Yesterday I also returned The Wheeler Centre keys to Melbourne Writers Festival, received a thank you gift, and had a business meeting regarding stuff that will probably fill up the day a week that previously belonged to MWF. It was a day full of “Moving Forward…” type thoughts, and receiving that Happy Birthday message last night made me ponder just how far I’ve come.

While at uni, we had a few guest speakers who plotted their career trajectory in some detail for us. They were never neat or tidy. They often involved happy accidents as the result of hard work. I think that almost all of the happy accidents that have gotten me to this point with my writing have linked in some way back to my blogging. If I hadn’t blogged, I hadn’t met, I hadn’t interviewed, I hadn’t applied for, I hadn’t gotten, I hadn’t been invited to, I hadn’t received… It’s all traceable, it’s all connected, and it all starts here.

Last weekend I sent off a job application for an editorship. In it, I was able to talk about my blogging experience. Whether I get that job or not, I am proud of this blog, and proud that I have it as something that I can point to and say, “Look what I’ve done. My hard work has become this thing.” It’s like my career’s a tree, and this blog is the trunk, with all these limbs and shoots sprouting off it.

I know that people read this blog, and I thank you for trusting me and coming back to me. I thank you for engaging, and for sometimes discussing the things I write. I thank you for subscribing, and for putting in a good word, and for taking me seriously.

Happy Birthday, blog! Now we are four.