Why I Made This Website

[428 words, 2 min estimated read time]

Back in May 2023 I realized dejectedly that my Tumblr account hadn’t been visible to anyone for months, after one of my friends told me she my account wasn’t visible when she tried sending me a message. I contacted support, and whatever the issue was they resolved on their end. Then a few months later I opened Tumblr to a message saying my account had been terminated.

I was panicked, confused about why my account was gone. Again I contacted support, wondering if my account had been hacked, or if my account had been flagged and removed for some reason. Without a response from support, they reinstated my account. And I was left with the only conclusion I could come to being that it was some sort of glitch that had accidentally suspended my account.

I was happy to have my account back, obviously, but was left with the whole situation feeling bittersweet. It wasn’t just about loosing my account- I had years worth of artwork that I no longer had the files or physical drawings of, and could only be found on that Tumblr account. And compared to other social media, it really was the only place I had really enjoyed for a while.

My account being invisible and months later being terminated happen back to back made me start to question how comfortable I really was with relying on social media to be my sole presence online.

So I started to look into making my own website.

I started with Carrd, and after having used it for a year now can say I genuinely really enjoyed using it. While at first I was overwhelmed with learning everything, I eventually realized I enjoyed making little edits and changes, and over time it transformed into something I was proud of. I began to think of it as a long-term art project in its own right, as I went back to change the color palette or readjust the layout or whatever else.

As much as I enjoyed it though, it still has limitations. Carrd isn’t a legit content management system, it’s not built for things like ongoing blogs or loads of images saved into it.

So while I still plan to cross post on social media occasionally, I figured I’d go ahead and carve out a piece of the web for myself. And while this site doesn’t look exactly how I want it to still, I hope it’ll take on that same feeling that my Carrd did- an ongoing art project I can learn from and improve creating in.