Holding on and on and on….

Wow.

The last time I posted a new blog it was December 2013.  At the time, my older son was working at a university in Seoul, celebrating his birthday a world away.

Tomorrow he moves to Vancouver, starting a new chapter of his life. Clichéd phrasing, but in a family of writers we forgive things like that.

When I started thinking about how to approach writing a blog after so much time had elapsed, I turned to Karin Tauscher Fuller. Not only is she a great friend, she is an award-winning columnist.

Show them what you’ve been up to, she wisely advised. Thanks to her I have photographic evidence of my activities the last year or so.

In reality, 2014 was a rough year of holding on and holding on and not letting go. My mom, and writing partner of 25 years, got seriously ill but has since recovered. The last year was…challenging. And now I’m finally back in the saddle and ready to start blogging again.

Many thanks to Karin and the family and friends who didn’t ride off into the sunset when the going got tough.

Happy Trails to all of us.

Change is gonna do you good…not!

According to recent news reports, the social media network Facebook is trying to replace LinkedIn as a professional connection service.

Okay, did you or did you not find that paragraph borrrring?

That first graph exemplifies what is happening to Facebook, a wonderful amalgamation of a ‘globalvillagecoffeeklatch- sixdegreesofkevinbacon’ experience.

As a former journalist I have nothing against the sacred five w’s and an h, but I don’t want the first thing I see on my friends’ ‘profile’ pages to be where they went to school, who they’re married to, and what their occupation is.

Borrrring.

Instead, give me a ‘personal’ barometer about how they’re feeling, the ‘h’ being the most neglected of the journalistic canon.

Yes, it’s just trading one kind of egomaniacal labeling for another.

But it’s that connectedness of the non-professional kind that makes social networking ‘social.’

I am not an advocate against change, having gone to three high schools and two colleges and having lived in five, count ‘em, five states.

Normally I embrace big changes, though I must admit smaller ones like a new pair of shoes or spectacles throw me.

Being a child of change is the very reason I adore Facebook. Or did. On any given day Facebook ‘newsfeed’ tells me how one of my very best friends from elementary school days in a frigid Great Lakes state is faring during a cold spell in her adult home in the south or how special former students of mind are doing in the ‘real world’ of marriage, parenthood, and work. Mark Zuckerberg’s brainchild (his movie pretend girlfriend was right; he is a jerk) allows a connectedness and interaction that transcends geographic and historical boundaries.

Now Facebook wants the first thing I see about my friends on their homepage to be where they went to school. I need my media scholar husband to explain the particulars to me, and I’m sure the ‘newsfeed’ will still feed me pertinent news, but in the end, I don’t want resumes.

I want the first thing I know about the boy with the curly hair and wool sweater whom I never kissed but probably should have 30 years ago, is that he’s having a good day with his son.

Professionally that knowledge is useless, but personally…it’s priceless.