This is long, but please read it! ^_^
1313 days, 355 posts, over 72000 views…
Glee has been….incredible. Though I’ll try right now, I don’t know if I’ll be able to express just how much the show and this blog means to me.
I think I’ve told this story before, but I’ll tell it again. On January 9th 2010, my brother and father went to a hockey game, so my mom and I decided to rent a movie. When at Blockbuster, my mom held up a copy of Glee Season 1 Volume 1: The Road To Sectionals. I didn’t watch much TV back then myself, but she had heard about Glee and suggested we watch it. She told me it was like High School Musical, so I agreed because why not? So we watched the first two or three episodes and it was unlike anything I had seen before. Teen pregnancies and gay kids and bullying? I was in eighth grade at a Catholic school so this was just super weird to me. We returned the DVDs the next day and I didn’t think about Glee for a while. A few months later, my mother informed me that Glee was going to be back on TV and suggested I watch. So I did. The first Glee episode I saw live was ‘Hell-O’. And since then…it’s been a blast. My love for Glee totally grew thanks to some people I was friends with at the time. They all watched the show too and we bonded over it, which was great. That Glee bond lasted until the start of S3. By then, all my friends either stopped watching it, or continued on for a bit but actively expressed dislike. By the middle of S3, there was just me. But I didn’t mind too much. I loved Glee and I didn’t care if my friends had commitment issues. I’m not friends with most of them now anyways.
This blog is also thanks to my mom. A new daughter-in-law of one of her old friends had a blog and my mom started reading blogs on cooking and whatnot. She suggested that I start a blog because I loved to write and suggested I write about Glee, as that was a topic I cared a lot about. So I did. This blog energized me. I loved writing it and keeping up with it and I am super proud I did. I looked forward to blogging so much. I went out of my way to find spoilers and songs and videos and it was great. I got so involved in the fandom and learned so much about TV and TV production and blogs and humans and news and the internet and social media. This is information that is relevant to me as I am now in a Communications program at University. But overall, I wanted my blog to be a place where Glee fans could go to get spoilers/news all in one place, written by an honest young person with nothing to lose, and for it to be a place for young eager Gleeks like myself or older Gleeks with less time to spend looking for this information. Did I succeed? I think so!
But Glee itself, the show, is just so special. It’s widely known how much of an impact Glee has made on society. I am so proud to be a part of the show’s supporters. I never really identified with a single character on that show (I’m not gay or black or in a wheelchair or have star qualities or…) but I still loved them all. And man, don’t even get me started on Klaine. I don’t know what it was about them (considering I didn’t really love Kurt in S1) but I love Klaine in ways that I’ve never felt for fictional characters before. They are my OTP above all OTPs and I’m so glad they exist. Following their journey for years has been fun. Following the journeys of all the characters and couples has been fun.
I’m not stupid enough to say that Glee hasn’t been weird at times. There have been moments where I seriously questioned the sanity of the writers. There have been episodes that I wish didn’t exist the way that they do. And yeah, more than once I did ask myself ‘what if I stopped watching?’ but each time I decided that I loved my blog too much and the show too much to just stop. I didn’t want to miss the good parts, even if I had to deal with some bad. And I’m glad I stuck around until the end because Glee was not an average TV show. It marked an era and I am so glad I was there to see it all happen.
Glee taught me a lot. It taught me about acceptance towards others, it taught me to be myself and it taught me to enjoy my friends. It opened me up to a whole bunch of new music (I have over 200 Glee songs on my phone and I love them all dearly). Glee taught me that showtunes are cool (I’ve been really into some Broadway shows in the past year). Glee taught me to never stop believing.
And so Glee might be over, but you know what’s not? The cast. Man, that Glee cast is the coolest, most talented people out there. It’s so good that Glee got them so young so we were able to see them grow and we will still be able to. Thanks to the cast, we’ve gotten books and albums and movies and musicals. Thanks to Darren, I was introduced to Team Starkid, which I love so much. We didn’t just get actors, we got idols and I am honoured to have such awesome, talented people to love and to look up to.
And while on the topic of the cast, I will never forget the events of July 2013 with the passing of Cory. I will never be able to forget how I felt on the morning of the 14th when I awoke to find Twitter bursting with sadness and new articles flying. Cory was such an important part of Glee (I loved and still do love Finchel) and I had only ever heard good things about him as a person. I had never experienced the death of a celebrity that I cared for before so I had no idea what to do or say or feel. So I am forever grateful to the fandom for their strength and togetherness. Knowing that there were many, many people out there who felt the same as me and had nothing to do but to scroll through twitter or other social media pages was a huge help. It was on that day that I was glad I had a blog and a place in the fandom because though Cory’s passing was sad, the unity that I saw was beautiful.
Anyways, this post is supposed to be about this blog and the fact that I will be ending it. I struggled with the decision for a while. I knew Glee would come to an end and I had no control over that, but I didn’t know what this blog would become, and I actually I do have control over this. But in the end I figured that this is a Glee blog, so without Glee, it can’t go on. And honestly I don’t want it to. Because I did consider keeping it going to keep the spirit alive. I could post about what the cast does or start posting fan products (art, videos, ect…) but I decided that it would get old fast and I don’t think there’d be an audience for that. So yeah, I’ll be ending this blog. I won’t delete it, though.
This blog has been so fun. I had something that was mine and people liked it. Every time I got a comment or a like or a new follower I was so shocked and happy. Blogging was my first go at something social media-related so followers, strangers who actually wanted continually to read stuff I wrote, was new to me and I loved it. I make a point of replying to every comment I get because sometimes it’s spawned great conversations and debates. I could talk about Glee for ages, so having people willing to engage in conversation with me, even for a bit, is awesome! Also through blogging I’ve followed some really cool blogs as well. There are millions upon millions of blogs out there and I know I’ve stumbled upon some really cool people with awesome blogs.
If you’re reading this now and you’ve been reading my posts since I began, then I thank you so much. I also apologize because sometimes I go back and read my old posts or cross-reference and I am honestly disgusted at my writing, full of errors or nonsense. Ew. I’m glad I improved, but to anyone who’s stuck with me, you deserve the biggest of big hugs. That being said, anyone who has read my blog, even once, deserves a thank you. I check my blog stats all the time and I am seriously so shocked when my stats are even over twenty a day and from countries all over the world (sometimes places I’ve never even heard of!). One day I had over 600 views and I almost cried. Sometimes I wonder how many readers are real humans. Sometimes I wonder if they’re just bots or something, y’know? But I know that some of you have to be real and so I thank y’all so much. I seriously love you guys and can’t express how much your support has meant to me. Fun blog fact: I am, to the best of my knowledge, the longest running consistent Glee-only blog on WordPress, so that’s awesome.
So what’s next? Is this the last you’ll see of me? As Mercedes Jones would say “Heeeeeeell to the no!” You see, I love blogging. I love the blogosphere and I want to explore it more. I want to keep blogging. I’ve wanted to do some un-Glee related blogging for a while, but I decided to wait until Glee finished. So Gleerificnewsstop is ending, but my blogging career is not. I’ve decided to make a new blog. This time, it won’t be about just one thing though…unless you count me as that thing. It’s not going to be a sappy ‘dear diary’ thing, it’ll be a fun place of reviews and funny things and my sparkling personality. I did consider just revamping this blog, but I decided to give it a fresh go.
My new blog is called Coolbeans4. Follow it (or at least check it out?). There’s not much there yet as I just started, but it’ll grow…. For the first time in forever, I have total freedom as to what to post and when. With Gleerificnewsstop, I posted when news/songs/episodes were released. I knew the schedule and I planned for it. I also knew the content. Perhaps this freedom on my new blog will take some getting used to or some time, but I am sure I’ll figure it out.
Side note: I don’t know how many of you follow my Twitter, but I have no idea what will happen with that. I’ll keep it going, that’s for sure, but it may get a little makeover too. I also don’t know if I’ll have my new blog automatically post on my Twitter. We’ll see…. But follow me if you want to, or on Tumblr.
Well, I don’t have much to say now. I hope you all understand how much this blog means to me and how much I’ll miss it. And how much I’ll miss Glee. That show will forever be my favourite. I can’t express how big of an impact Glee has had on my last six years, or this blog on the last four. So, now, for my final goodbye. Again, thank you so much to everyone who’s read my posts, commented, liked a post, followed me or shared a link. Every view was important to me. I’ll be forever grateful for letting me enjoy my first blogging experience. To those who’ll follow me to Coolbeans4, then see you soon, but to those who are not, this is the end for us, so like Coach Beiste said to Puck in ‘The Quarterback’, “have a good line.”
That’s all for now.
gleerificnewsstop 