Today happens to be the anniversary of nothing. At least in relation to this blog. But a few things are happening that I want to pause and acknowledge.

First, I expect the next two weeks to witness the birth of my third child. I composed the early posts in my head while rocking my eldest son, then a baby, to sleep. I would re-listen to Russia in Revolution by SA Smith while walking him around the house in a sling, pausing long enough to scribble notes for the blog, but not long enough to wake him. I mentioned the birth of my second son here two and a half years ago. While raising my wonderful boys, I have been tending this little blog on the side through the same period.

If you want to start some creative project like this but you think maybe you’re too busy, well, I’ve been busy and still got this done.

I’m grateful that each year thousands of people, spread across every continent on the planet, have been reading my words. Today marks my annual visitor count overtopping those of any previous year, with two and a half months left to go.

Seeing where my readers are coming from is always fascinating. When the great Bob Dylan forum expectingrain.com brought a windfall of traffic my way, I noticed a wave of Germans and a wave of US Americans checking in 6-8 hours apart. The Irish are usually the biggest contingent but this year they are a modest third behind the US and Canada. The blog is in the English language so it’s no surprise that the UK and Australia make up the next largest parts of the readership.

But in the last 6 and especially the last 3 weeks something very interesting has happened: a massive spike in visitors from China. They are the fifth-largest national grouping among my readers this year, and the largest this month and last month. These readers do not seem to be looking at my few posts about China (William Hinton and Cixin Liu) any more than any other nationality.

It’s possible that the stats WordPress gives me are warped by strange internet anomalies beyond lay understanding. Maybe there are different rules in different jurisdictions for WordPress to read someone’s IP address; maybe minor tweaks to regulations in certain countries can produce an engagement mirage… I don’t know. But I really like the idea that I’m being read and shared by hundreds of people in China. I like it a lot more than I expected it.

The numbers are good and getting better, even though my regular readers will have noticed I’m not posting as much. Gradually in the last six months, after four years of weekly posts without fail, I have dropped down to, in effect, monthly posts. It’s going to stay that way for a while, not least because there’s a new baby on the way. One way or the other I feel it’s a necessary change of gears. But The 1919 Review has never gone dormant and I don’t foresee that it will. Readers, sharers, subscribers, paying supporters: thank you.