Can you believe it girls? This past week was the one-year anniversary since I started SWEETIE on Substack. It was a big year, and in many ways it was wonderful, surreal, and, at times, exquisitely difficult. No matter what happened in my life, though, I had a weekly constant, my North Star. I had to write about very, very, very important things, to a very, very, very small audience.
I first launched SWEETIE on a different platform in 2020 and gave up after two months. When people started asking me how I was going to market the original newsletter, I panicked. I had spent years making a living from marketing and advertising, but when it came to my own creative project, I was rudderless. I was unsure how to scale it and the thought of actively working to get more readers paralysed me. I quit. And I regretted that decision until I relaunched in 2022.
I understand now what I couldn’t quite come to terms with then — SWEETIE can just be whatever I want it to be. It doesn’t have to be a perfectly marketable item, curated to a tee and ready to be elevator pitched at any given minute. It can be messy and goofy and fluid. It is an extension of who I am, after all.
I don’t do this to make money (obviously…) or to get followers or attain any kind of hoopla, I do it because it’s fun. I do it because I love making people chuckle, if I’m lucky. Plus, the planet it is burning. Sometimes it’s enough to just try a little bit, to do something for the sake of it, have a little go, be a little cringe, write a silly little Substack.
It’s funny, kind of, to meditate on what success means for a creative project like this. Over 40,000 words have landed in inboxes far and wide over the last year from this humble publication, and sometimes I self-consciously worry that those words were a waste. But I know it’s not true. Someone has to hold Tori Spelling accountable, after all.
SWEETIE is both my redheaded stepchild and my most prized possession. “You’re still doing that blog?” someone asked me, rudely, a few months ago. Yeah, bitch, I am. I do it when it’s hard and when it’s inconvenient and when I’m on holiday and when I have to decline plans to make it happen and when I’m tired and when I think it’s not worth my time anymore, another chore, still, I write the damn newsletter. I committed to something, and I am going to drive this silly little Substack until I run out of road.
To celebrate this milestone I am going to do something I haven’t done during the last year — I am not writing a SWEETIE Weekly, just this once. To reward myself for never skipping a week, I am, indeed, skipping a week. It’s a favour for the both of us. I will be back next week with more vim, vigour and venom than ever before.
Thank you for indulging me. I am so grateful for all of you who read it. In fact, I’m a little verklempt thinking about how much support I’ve received. It really is very touching. And shout out to my one reader in Germany. Ich möchte mich recht herzlich bedanken!
Lots of love ❤️️❤️️❤️️
MK