# If this is a community, then this metric matters.

http://i67.tinypic.com/23k28nk.jpg

Yesterday I passed one hundred followers, and my reputation is up to 45.5. My numbers had stalled for a bit because nobody knew me (I wasn’t doing promotion at all) and I had stopped blogging while I figured out the site. My earnings are abysmal, but slightly less abysmal than they were. At the same time, I’ve struggled with illness for weeks and weeks and have debated what to do about the fact that I live in a wonderful place that seems to be making me sick.

Tonight, though, I found the Steemit metric that matters, in this comment by @bmwrider53 (emphasis added):

>	I am a huge Genesis fan (particularly of the Ant/Steve era) and know Chris' work. **What a fantastic comment, you have made my evening.** Thank you. You are right, sometimes there are more important things we need to do. 

His comment was in response to my comment on [this blog of his](https://steemit.com/life/@bmwrider/never-never-never-give-up-from-failed-musician-and-high-school-dropout-to-the-halls-of-academia). His blog talked about failing early on as a musician after dropping out of school, and the hungry days after that before he joined the Coast Guard, earned a college degree, and taught in an inner city school. He defends his dissertation tomorrow (good luck, @bmwrider) and will soon release a CD.

I had read @bmwrider’s intro and his series about teaching, so the response I made tonight concerned the gifts that might have resulted from that early failure:

>	I'm glad you're giving yourself a second chance with your music, but your blog made me start thinking about Field of Dreams. If you had succeeded at music when you were young, you might not have become a teacher when you did--or ever--and therefore wouldn't have changed the lives you've changed.

>	Chris Stewart had a very short-lived career as a drummer with Genesis, an effort that had started with high school friends playing together. He wasn't considered good enough for the band to keep him on. He eventually bought a farm in a remote part of Spain and wrote a series of hilarious memoirs beginning with Driving Over Lemons. I selfishly am so glad he failed as a young musician. If he had succeeded back then, the trajectory of his life would have changed, and Driving Over Lemons and the books that followed wouldn't exist. Even if he had written books, they would be different books.

>	I hope that all your life experiences that resulted from that early failure will enrich your music.

My comment made his night, and *his reply* made *my* night, and that, my friends, is the metric that matters to me.