Apologies for the extra post (what do you all do with your week when you’re not hearing from me?), but I just published a piece through The Coffeelicious, a magazine on Medium.com, and since both of them are new for me, I’m going to shamelessly promote it. And introduce Medium to anyone who hasn’t explored it yet.
“I Pledge Allegiance to the–Queen?” is about taking U.K. citizenship, which turned out to be a surprisingly emotional issue for me. If you like the essay, it would be great if you’d hit the Recommend button at the end. If you don’t like it, you won’t reach the end, so don’t worry about it. (Seriously, I wouldn’t ask you to recommend anything you don’t like. It’s almost like–am I really going to say this?–faking an orgasm. Yes, apparently I am going to say that. I’m not sure what I think about it, never mind how I feel.)
Shockingly relevant graphic. Not mine. I found it on Wikimedia.
And with that out of the way, the rest of this is for those of you who either write more than blog fodder–and I know that’s a good number of you–or read more than blogs. Because not everything belongs in a blog, and I’ve been looking for outlets beyond mine. I’m hoping this will move me in that direction.
Medium describes itself as a place “where people share ideas and stories that are longer than 140 characters and not just for friends.” In theory, at least, it helps you find your audience. We’ll see. Technically, Medium makes it fairly easy to publish, although I obsessed about the mechanics for weeks before submitting anything, and only did it after investing something like $10 (it seems to be $12; never trust me with numbers) in a probably unnecessary but still helpful manual.
From what I’ve read, the good thing about Medium is that stories have a chance to build slowly–it’s not all about the first few hours, or days, or even weeks. Stories recommended by a lot of people become more visible. And we all like to believe that those are the best ones. They may be. It would be nice to think so. It also explains why I was asking people to hit that Recommend button. (I should mention that you have to sign up to recommend anything. It’s not a big deal, says the person who closes down her computer and hides under a chair when asked to sign up for anything. You can do it with Facebook or Twitter–and if you plan to publish on Medium, you should eventually add both connections.)
Medium also sets it up so that as a reader you can follow writers you like and get a notification when they publish something new (which, of course, lets writers, with luck, build a following) or follow magazines that filter and gather the work that’s most relevant to you. I’ve found some good writing there. If you haven’t seen it, it’s worth a browse.
Notes from the U.K. 
It does look interesting! I did like your essay – it’s great – but as I’m not signed up it wouldn’t let me ‘recommend’. But if anyone asks, I definitely recommend it, without doubt. Not a great deal of help to your article, but the thought is there! :)
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I should go back into the post and mention signing up. I tend to draw back at signing up for stuff–no good reason, it just seems to be how I’m constructed. Either way, I appreciate the thought–and the reminder.
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I shall have a gander. Thanks for posting. Kris.
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My thanks.
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Read, appreciated and recommended :)
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Many thanks.
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Recommended. Your article reminds me of a quote by Thor Heyerdahl, the Norwegian explorer. “Borders, what borders? I’ve heard they exist in the minds of some people but I´ve never seen one”.
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Thanks for reading and recommending. And many thanks for the quote. It’ll stay with me.
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I’m a bit worried about it taking over my Twitter account, but have chanced it! I’m glad us natives don’t have to pledge allegiance to the queen (and I hope they let me back in again…)
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I didn’t like that Twitter account thing either, but having allowed it I promptly forgot all about it, which is why I didn’t mention it. So far it doesn’t seem to have sent out anything that embarrassed me–as least not that I know about. And gee, I hope they let you back in too. If not, let me know and I’ll see how many people we can organize to demand your release. Bloggers of the world, unite!
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Really good article. I enjoyed reading it. BTW – there are more than a few British Citizens who don’t go for the Monarchy thing and would be happy for the UK to be a republic. But I guess if we became a republic, we’d have to remove the ‘K’ from UK and just be the U of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
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And I’ve met many of them. But a republic doesn’t seem to be high up on the political agenda right now–or at least it’s not showing up when I dump my cup out and read the political teabags. Maybe that wasn’t the teabags I was supposed to read. Anyway, my own feeling is that the anti-monarchists have missed a trick by not adopting the slogan Free the Royals–End Monarchy Now. Honestly, what a bizarre, horrid way to live.
As a name, the U.G.B.&N.I. lacks a certain something, and maybe that’s another reason a republic is down so far on the agenda. We need to sharpen that a bit before anyone’s going to take it seriously.
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Interesting article, made me consider which is always a good thing. On visits to the USA I’ve enjoyed flag waving patriotism and belief in ‘the American way’. Back here in Blighty we seem to get very uncomfortable with any flag waving or visible signs of being ‘proud to be British’ – with the exception of the Olympics and Her Maj’s birthday. If you look back in history most countries have had ‘moments’ they’d rather forget and having a longer history than most we possibly have more ‘moments’. Anyway, I digress. Welcome to ‘Being British’, you seem to have had to go through more than most of us so called citizens to achieve it so you’ve more than earned your space on this weird little island we like to call home.
ps I recommended x
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Thanks on all counts. That’s a wonderful welcome.
Since I’ve been here, I’ve admired the lack of flag waving. I can’t help but connect flag waving with a we’re-better-than-everyone-else attitude, which in the U.S. gets expressed, repeatedly and without a moment’s hesitation, in the phrase, “It’s the greatest country in the world.”
Based on what? How many countries have you (whoever the you of the moment is) actually compared it to? And how do you compare countries anyway? They all have something to offer. They all have some things no one wants to talk about–or worse, that they’re fine with but in my opinion, at least, shouldn’t be. So yeah, flag waving? It makes me a bit twitchy.
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Thought your article was very well done! I love how you make something entirely enjoyable to read. You do have a real gift.
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What a nice thing to say. Thanks.
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I’ve heard about Medium, but never really had a chance to use it. I just might try it out now based on your little evaluation here. :)
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It’s worth a few experiments. I’ll be interested to know how it works for you.
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