Today has already been an interesting day. Today, after a year and a half and over 300 different posts, I retired my hockey blog.

There are quite a few reasons I have for making this decision, many of which I won’t discuss here as I firmly believe that what happens behind closed doors needs to not make its way onto a public(ish) site. If you’re really curious, ask me. I might tell you.

The biggest reason for this, though, is simple.

Life.

Real life, MY life, the one I’m living right now, has been filling up. I have been doing what I can to take full advantage of things, to EXPERIENCE things, and I was running out of time to give my fullest devotion and effort to the blog, as much as I loved it.

A year and a half ago when my friend Mike suggested I contact the network CEO about writing for her/them, there was a lot of hesitation on my part. I knew how to write, but to write about hockey? I mean, hell, I had only been watching the sport for a year. But I went for it. There were A LOT of growing pains, a lot of time spent finding my voice and my place within not only the network, but within the Blues blogosphere as well. Some of those growing pains hurt like a motherfucker.

The thing is, back then I was struggling. I was struggling really hard with my place in life and how things were going at the time. There were a lot of really down days back then. The blog was a bit of a lifeline for me.

It gave me a sense of purpose, something to work for and towards, something to distract me from the not-so-great days. It allowed me to create a niche, however unexpected, and let me feel one of the greatest senses of belonging ever.

What I didn’t expect, though, were the benefits from such a thing. There were things like becoming a better writer and learning more about the sport of hockey in a matter of months than I ever thought possible. There was the absolute crashing face first, head over heels (further) in love with the Blues. There was an undeniable feeling of connectedness to my city. It brought me closer to friends I’d already had because I was more capable of intelligently discussing this sport.

More importantly than any of that is the people.

There have been the people I’ve had the pleasure of talking to strictly on and because of the Twitterverse and that ever so awesome #stlblues hashtag.

Some of the other writers for the network have become incredibly important parts of my life. There have been Aerys meetups and inside jokes (font bowler…heh) and one particular graphic artist who became and still is a phenomenal friend, with whom I have spent COUNTLESS hours talking to. Then of course there’s Miranda, a fellow writer, who has quickly become one of my closest friends.

But the kicker has been the other Blues fans I’ve met. The people who started as screen names on Game Time or a Twitter handle but who became the people I most wanted to spend time with before, during, and after Blues games. These people became my friends and my fellow tailgaters and road tripping compadres and my half-marathon running buddies and, in a somewhat roundabout way, my boyfriend. They became a family, of sorts. A dysfunctional, sometimes argumentative, always insane, yet incredible and supportive Blues family. There have been some awful days where only their comments and hugs have lifted me up.

I am SO LUCKY to have them.

So I suppose it’s the end of an era. I’ll still contribute to Aerys where I can, but the days of You’re My Boys, Blues are over. It’s been a great era, but it’s time to tackle the next thing life has to offer.

Here we go.