Visions of Eight

On 26 January 2010, on a whim, I started Rebel’s Notes. That was eight years ago today. Today I want to reflect back to the past eight years.

How did it start? I think it must have been a moment where I told Master T that I want to put my writing online, he said I should do it and next thing I had a blogger blog, called Rebel’s Notes. Why the name? I have always seen myself as a rebel as I never felt I fitted into the ‘normal’ way things are done, but I never did rebellious things. Except for getting pregnant when I was 16.
I wanted to do something with the name and since I wanted to use the blog for my writing, I came to the name ‘Rebel’s Notes’. It was simply going to be a place where I could put my stories. Nothing more.

I posted two stories in two parts (they are still on the blog but I cringe when I read them!) and then stopped posting for months, because nothing happened. No one read it. It was November before I finally had an idea how I wanted to continue and by the first birthday of the blog I had discovered Twitter and how to promote my blog.

I think it was in 2011 that I moved over to WordPress and then, in 2012 I went to a self-hosted site and never looked back.

With this being the eight birthday of this creation of mine, I want to look back on what I have achieved with something I have started ‘on a whim’:

• I started Wicked Wednesday in June 2012 when both Wank Wednesday and Wanton Wednesday stopped. It first started on my main site, but later I made a sub-domain for it.
• Also in 2012, on 1 December to be precise, I started a Dutch writing group which I hosted for five years before passing the control on to someone else so I could concentrate fully on the English community. I also hosted an erotic writing marathon for four of those five years.
• In the years I have also taken over and started other memes, but I am not actively promoting them anymore. Those memes are: The Oral Sex Project, The Menopause Diaries and Sexy Searching. I do check the memes occasionally to see if new posts have been linked.
• We will be attending Eroticon for the fifth time this year. We didn’t go to the first and last year we canceled our plans because of my mom’s illness.
• In the 8 years of my blog I have gone from being entirely secretive about it to the point where everyone knows I have a blog, but only a selected few has the link.
• My first book has been published in 2016 and I have been published in several anthologies.
• My blog has been mentioned on several top lists over the years.
• Last, but not least, I have started a new project which I am planning to do for years: the Smut Marathon.

Back when I started this blogging journey, I have never thought it would bring me what it did. It gave me more self-confidence, made me meet beautiful people and allowed me to be who I really am, to follow my passions and help other people where I can while writing about my own experiences and thoughts. I love the erotic community. It’s one of the most welcoming and loving communities there is!

Most years I have celebrated my blogoversary with some kind of photo, but this year I want to point you to eight stories with more than 2 parts:

• 2011: Bus Tour (26)
• 2012: Jailbird (17)
• 2012: Katie & Steve (21)
• 2012: Custom officials (4)
• 2014: The instructor (21)
• 2016: On The Rocks (6)
• 2016: Sergeant Brute (4)
• 2017: Finally A Prostitute (4)

There are more, but because it’s the eight birthday of this blog, I will leave it at that.

One thing that I never forget is that my blog would not have been a success if you, my readers, have not continuously supported me. Thank you for that! I’m planning to stay at least another 8 years, but possibly even twice as long. I’m not planning to go anywhere anytime soon!

Oh, and just for the record, because I am quite the stats whore: this is the 2210th post on Rebel’s Notes!

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© Rebel’s Notes

Marie Rebelle

Marie Rebelle is an erotic author and the driving force behind Rebel’s Notes. She’s creator of the weekly meme Wicked Wednesday and organizer-coordinator of the Smut Marathon. She has been published in several anthologies and her debut novel, Flight LU-365, was published in 2016. Marie resides in the Netherlands, but hails from South Africa. Neither Dutch nor English is her first language, but she manages better in both than the one she grew up with.

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