Part 1: From Blogger to Author

Rita Arens

I first met Rita Arens when I was an editor for an online magazine in 2000. In 2006, she hired me to write and edit tax content when she was an editor at H&R Block. I’ve watched Rita break free from the corporate cubicle to blogger and writing bliss.

Today she’s an assignment and syndication editor for BlogHer and a freelance writer. She has written over 50 articles for periodicals, including Scholastic Parent & Child, Babble, The Kansas City Star, Greater Kansas City Business, KC Weddings, Art and Ingram’s.
I asked Rita to share with you how she made that journey.

1) How long were you blogging before you started working on your book Sleep is for the Weak?
I started my blog [Surrender, Dorothy] in 2004, and I started working on Sleep Is for the Weak in early 2005.

2) How did you get the idea for your blog?
I was on maternity leave, and I didn’t have the energy to do the fiction and poetry writing I’d been doing prior to birthing a live human. A friend told me about blogging, and it seemed a perfect way to write without over-committing myself to a narrative arc. I consider my blog to be a writing exercise, and I use it like practicing scales—I try to hone different elements of my voice as well as see what people are interested in reading about. Readers are fickle beasts.

3) How do you get ideas for your posts? How often do you post?
I try  to post every weekday unless I’m traveling or on vacation, though it usually averages out to four times a week. My  posts are a combination of personal anecdotes, response essays to something going on in the world or to an article I’ve read elsewhere, pieces of larger works, and journaling.
I try to mix it up and not do too many essays or too many anecdotes in a row. Example: I recently did a follow-up on corn syrup to a post that originated on BlogHer because I found after I wrote the first post that I really wasn’t done talking. Another example: Yesterday I wrote an essay in response to an article about women’s anger that I read in Good Housekeeping. Today I wrote about my daughter and the Tooth Fairy.

4) How did your blog lead to an anthology of other mommy bloggers?
I originally tried to put together a book based on my own blog. It was called Riding in the Back Window, because my blog tagline was “When I Was Your Age, We Just Let Them Ride in the Back Window.” I thought it was hilarious. But nobody got the title, and I was a big nobody, and it just wasn’t working out. So I did the smart thing: I gave up on that project, but I didn’t give up on the idea of a book.

Next time: The writing process and promoting your blog! — Leilani Haywood

P.S. Who’s your favorite blogger? A few of mine are Rita Arens, Michael Hyatt and Seth Godin.

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