An American Princess, Revisited

Twenty years later, I'm back to blogging.

Twenty years ago this week, I started a blog, mostly out of boredom. I had no idea how that one decision would impact my life. None.

At this juncture, I owe my career, most of my friendships, possibly my marriage and children, to that one thing I did, twenty years ago, on the floor of my room in my parents house, desperate for a break from law school.

The American Princess, at peak, probably got around ten thousand hits a month. It’s sucessor, Naked DC, probably around thirty thousand. They were never among the biggest names in conservative media, let alone media in general, but they afforded me the ability to mix at much higher levels than I had ever imagined. I’ve come a long way from those blogs — I’m far more moderate, far more Catholic, far more flexible, and perhaps far less of an idealist — but in many ways, they’re foundational elements of my personality, and the truest expression of what has made me, arguably, a successful writer.

Because of American Princess, I gained an audience that followed me to social media, and friends who offered me the opportunity to mix with other political writers. That, in turn, landed me my first political job in Chicago. When I left that job a year and a half later, I started working in digital communications — a field I’d stay in through two presidential elections. During that time, I jumped from a small Blogspot blog to the American Spectator, and then to the Wall Street Journal. Then to the Daily Wire. I rose through the ranks. I moved to Nashville. I joined network news.

Then, I almost died. And I’ve struggled with that failure ever since.

It’s not that I don’t have gainful employment — I work in creative writing and I love it. It’s not that I don’t have personal fulfillment. But sometimes, things crash around you and you just don’t know how to pick up the pieces, so you struggle on for a couple of years, a couple of therapists, a handful of hobbies, while you try to figure out where you stand.

People know me now that have never known my past as an unpaid, over-opinionated blogger, and I’ve long since grown out of my need to command the political spotlight. My success doesn’t hinge on whether I carve out time in my day to sarcastically comment on current events. And the media landscape has changed; blogging isn’t exacly a thriving medium.

I’ve often struggled with this newsletter because I’ve framed its existence in terms of material success, similar to the kind I’d already achieved — the kind of success I found with blogging the first time around. But the truth is, I never started that blog looking for success. I just wanted to write. About anything. The success came without me having to try, maybe because I wasn’t looking for it.

It also ignored that American Princess brought me more than material success — it helped me cement lifelong friendships, something not easy to do when you’re mostly introverted, since those friendships have to carry you along kicking and screaming. My husband maintains that he didn’t know I was a blogger when he met me, but I don’t think there was any way to avoid it. My kids wouldn’t exist without it.

So What is Growing Olives?

Lets say, it’s the same thing as “Because, Obviously,” but more of it. Daily content. Commitment. Interesting stuff to read. Cultural stuff. Your subscription, if you have one, will finally start to come in handy.

I’m starting again. Longer name. A more personal objective. This is a blog, no doubt, but like American Princess before it, it’s something more. Starting in the new year, this will become a forum for sharing my recovery, my life, my backyard homestead project, and my knowledge — hopefully for an audience that is looking to learn how to run a home, a farm, and a life, with the same sense of humor that won me fans in the first place.

And yes, I’m finally launching that podcast. Two of them, to be clear. One will be available widely and one will eventually be for subscribers.

I, by no means, lead a perfect life. But I try to live a lovely life. I try to seek joy, especially after being hit with the realization that life could be shorter than I predicted. And I want to share that; we’re obsessed with these aesthetically beautiful “trad” lifestyles, but there’s no reason we can’t get that in normal daily life. And I want to share that in a place that gives me more control than just, say, Twitter.

Will there be politics? Maybe. The funny thing about age is that I’m a lot less convicted in my beliefs than I once was, twenty years ago, when I assumed I had all the answers and just needed to speak them louder and to a wider audience. I’m more about culture now, probably because I have kids and my focus is on planting trees I’ll never climb — a better world for them, not necessarily for me.

I also have paid gigs where I can pontificiate, so that’s a bit different, too.

I don’t know if material success is in my future; I can’t think about that and also maintain a stoic commitment to content creation, it seems. But if I get to know you all better, that seems to be just as valuable.

What I do know is that I need to do this every single day.

See you soon!

Much love,

Emily