Brass Balls and Brass Tacks

Putting yourself out there for global view on the internet is a scary thing.  Because even if you use a pseudonym, you still wrote it.  You feel the words from the comments seep into you.  Every piece you write is a part of you, whether it's a story or a fictional piece.  It's your life or your creation on display for the world to see...like stepping onstage naked.  Will the curtain rise to crickets chirping?  An audience who laughs at you in ridicule or the way you intend? 

For some writing comes very easy.  They can entertain with their vignettes of playfully strung words.  For others it's a difficult process as they agonize over topics and word choices.  It takes brass balls to put yourself out there in any creative outlet, but in blogging we put our lives on display with every post.

That being said, before BlogHer last year I had this idea for a Brass Balls award.  I bounced it off of Kristin, and the ideas just sprung to life.  Bouncing back and forth we came up with a plan.  Happily, that plan is about to come to fruition.  

The Brass Balls Award itself had to have merit.  Not just a pair of friends choosing from on high.  We attempted to create a system to it.  To achieve this, we enlisted the help of Aunt Becky from Mommy Wants Vodka to figure out how to get this off the ground right.  Kristin and I decided it needed a physical award too...a momento that recognizes, in its small way, that their courageous contribution was appreciated.  So I collected some supplies and placed them into Kristin's magically crafty hands.

The recipient had to be an exemplary post that took an amazing amount of guts to not only type out but put out there for the world to see.  As bloggers we virtually meet a lot of you through your blogs and comments; we travel with you through your trials and leap with you in your joys.  But you can feel it when someone has really gone the distance and emotionally trudged themselves out.  It took a set of brass balls to post it...to expose and share something about their life that's so close in such a bare and raw way.  There are plenty of people looking for attention through drama...but you can sense real from a mile off. 

This realness is what I think draws people to blogging.  Real people discussing real life.  We paint pictures with words...but it's the brass tacks that hold the canvas in place before the pretty frame hides it and hangs it on the wall.   Soon we'll be revealing the first recipient and unveiling the prize we've created to go along with it.