LaurieWrites

Today It's Suebob's Birthday

Once upon a time in the land of Chicago, I was on a panel of women who blogged and did not concurrently have children. Suebob Davis was on that panel with me. 

I had never met her, but I knew of her, and oddly enough, I was a little intimidated by her. I don't know why. She's not particularly menacing in person. She doesn't carry a gun or any weapon, other than her brain, and I guess the stapler could be used as a projectile. She is a peace freak of sorts, and a smiley person, too. But regardless, I was intimidated. Sometimes I'll randomly decide that a person doesn't like me for no reason at all, because I am a special sort of paranoid when I get anxious. And that BlogHer, I was anxious. After a few years of flying happily under the blogging radar, I was on that panel and I was also a community keynote reader, so I was operating at a high level of Xanax need for pretty much the whole conference.

So when the lady who was moderating, who herself did not have children, asked the final question -- "Just what was it we ladies on the panel did with our lives, as we were not busy parenting?" -- my mind started racing. 

I blog! I, uh, take pictures! I work a mind-numbing, soul-sucking job that nonetheless helps people! I take care of my grandmother sometimes! I manage my life and work out and eat and go on vacation and screw around on the internet! I see my friends and my family and listen to music and take long walks in the suburbs!

Sue, however, wasn't having any of that. She calmly stated that she didn't feel that she needed to reel off a laundry list of activities to justify her existence. She lived a life, and it was good, and that was that. 

And then she stopped talking. She wasn't going to entertain it, which was then a much more foreign concept to me than it is now, due to the example of Sue and other women in my life, who have shown my by example and a well-placed "Oh God will you please just cut that OUT" as I reached my 40th year that just because someone asks a question, it doesn't mean I have to answer it. I do not -- I DO NOT -- have to justify my existence or my choices or myself.  That panel was the first time, but not the last, that she has said something and I've thought, "Damn. I need to be more like that." 

Time and months and years went on, and that panel turned into a community keynote that turned into a Twitter relationship that turned into hanging out at BlogHers and every year. I've been pleasantly surprised that this very well-regarded, powerful source for good in my blogging world has sought me out and wanted to spend time with me. That is no kind of false modesty, either. These events are zoos, yes, but they are also populated with hundreds of people, and the basic truth is that there are a lot of people there that we all want to see. They come alive from the internet for just a few days, like toys in an animated film, and then they go back in. You have to take what you can get where you can. 

And as I get older, I realize the honor it is for any human being to want to spend their limited time with any other one. Time is all we have that makes any nevermind, and when someone I respect and admire and find interesting chooses to use it up with me? I appreciate it, and I acknowledge it as a meaningful thing. 

Since then, Sue and I have hung out in New York and Chicago again, and this year we will spend some time together in San Diego, I'm sure. We sat together in a canyon in Ojai last fall, and one of the greatest days I've had, she drove me and Deb up (down? I fail geography) the coast to her house and then on to L.A. I got to see her adorable house and eat at her tacqueria that I would transport to DC in an instant, if I could. I got to meet Goldie, and her mom. It was a great day. She came here once, too, and Sarah and I met her for brunch on our turf, which was fun. 

Virtually, we have spent hours Gchatting about jobs and family and writing and just what on earth it is we're here to do. And there is, of course, always Twitter, for good or for ill. (Just please don't say the p-word.) 

I am lucky that she is my friend. 

But beyond the micro-confines of this particular one-on-one relationship, I find Sue worth celebrating for a very simple fact that goes far beyond me. And that is that she is always the one to see the good in other people. She gets pissed off, sure, at situations, mostly, and the occasional blowhard with a vuvuzela or what have you in her neighborhood. But when it comes to people she knows and cares about? Super forgiving. Ridiculously forgiving, and, most valuable: preemptively forgiving. Even that time I broke my phone and never answered and she texted "Fuck you!" to me so that was the first thing I saw when I turned the replacement back on? I knew it was only temporary. 

I admit it, there are times when I read stuff on the Internet and I think "Holy hell, what is that person's deal. Could they shut up already? OMFG." And that is unfailingly the moment where Sue will pipe up with a tweet to that person that offers some kind of kindness, a good word or a comment or a thoughtful detail about her life that acknowledges not only their current situation but in a broader sense, what is redeeming about them. And I'll think, why didn't I notice that first? What is she, some kind of friggin' saint, showing me up, as I sit here in my living room all judgmental and dark-hearted? 

No. It has nothing to do with me. It's just her. She sees the goodness. She sees the gold, and that is a remarkable quality. I don't always understand it, and I sure as hell don't always agree, but I always admire it.

Happy birthday, Suebob. I hope you enjoy the good words of people from around the internet about you today, and know that they couldn't be offered in more friendship, appreciation, kindness and love. We owe each other a 40/50 toast in San Diego, for sure. I thank you for everything you have done and said to make my world a better place, and I love you very much. 

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Suebob's favorite charities right now are Write Girl (an amazing organization in L.A. that supports self-expression for young women, where I wish I was the director) and Planned Parenthood, which has obviously suffered major cuts in funding and support this year. I have set up a fund via my PayPal, and bloggers have already kicked in a few hundred dollars. When it is all done, I will be splitting the proceeds in half and donating equally to these organizations, taking care to make sure that the funds are diverted as closely as possible to her region.

If you would like to participate in this birthday gift for Sue, please leave a comment below, and I will send you my PayPal contact information. (I am documenting all donations, so there should be no worry about fund transfers to me for this purpose.) I'd like to finish this up by Wednesday of next week, so please get your messages to me by then. Thanks! 

Finally, Karen came up with this wonderful idea to celebrate Suebob's birthday. If you write a post too, please leave a link on her site as well. 

My Five Fabulous Bloggers

Thanks to Trop50 for sponsoring my writing about fabulous bloggers. This year Trop50 is granting 50 Fabulous Wishes. Click here to enter for a chance to win $1,000 to celebrate a friend with a refreshing attitude about looking and feeling fabulous!

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Picking five fabulous bloggers out of the hundreds that I've met over the years is an out-of-control task. I've been sitting here thinking about it longer than anyone should have, really, but that's just my way. In the end, I decided to go with the five people who came to the top of my mind first, whose words, pictures and online presence have significantly influenced my daily life and my own work as a blogger. 

Short story: I've been really, really lucky. 

Deb, Deb on the Rocks. 

Deb is brilliant. Everyone who meets her or reads her says pretty much the same thing, but it's never played out because it's just the perfect word. She is also riotously funny, a well of compassion, an outstanding writer and a savvy businesswoman and entrepreneur. 

I mean, just read this, this about earworms. I'm obsessed with earworms, I'm always singing in my head, and I talk about them a lot. Yet, yet! Deb writes about them like that, and I never even want to try. Even now, I'm writing about Deb, feeling a little anxious because I know I could never write about Deb as well as Deb writes about anything.

That's sort of meta, which is fitting, as she's also into all things meta. But the thing about her is, that she would want me to try. She would tell me that I could write the little earworm post that could, in my own style, and that it would be fine. This is another reason why she's fabulous. 

This all has me thinking that I don't know why Deb isn't world famous, honestly, why some big bucks site or Vanity Fair hasn't snapped her up as a columnist. I mean it. Somebody get on that. You won't be sorry. 

Jonna, Jonniker.

Jonna makes me laugh and makes me think and makes me start these DM chains that end 12 messages later with us both in the right place, because we have that kind of brain meld. This is fitting, because I met Jonna on Twitter and like most of my favorite online relationships I have no idea how it started. I have also had the attention span of a gnat for the past two years and have not been the best blog citizen, so I have to admit that I hadn't read her blog much when we first started talking. I'm still an erratic reader, at best, but what you get from Jonna is the real deal diarist material that got most of us into this in the first place.

She is also one of the best writers in my corner of the web. She's smart and passionate and funny. Whenever people have expressed surprise at the fact that I read blogs written by parents that are to some extent about their children I've had to explain that if a person can tell an engaging story, they can be writing about kids or cars of canoes, I don't care. Jonna is one of those people. The way she tells her story grabs you and carries you along if you let it, and I like to let it. She is also not afraid to share the more difficult things with simple honesty, and that is something I don't see done so frequently or so well anymore. 

Also, and I know this may be shocking, but people without children can actually read stories by people with children -- some of them even containing information about these children -- and be completely interested. As Jonna would say, "OMFG!" 

(That's her on the right. I'm in the middle in the glowy thing, and Jennie is on the left.) 

Sarah, Sarah and the Goon Squad.

I have not even known Sarah for three years. I just had to do that simple math several times over in my head to make sure it was right because that is just crazy.   

Sarah is my best friend, which if you've read this blog for any amount of time or seen us bicker online you probably know. I met her for the first time at a blogging event after years of us writing for the same website but never really interacting, and because I was busy suffering from a freak accident and having a weird immediate connection with her, I didn't ask her the main question I had at the time, which was "What in the hell is a goon squad?" (Now that I've met them I know it's kind of difficult to explain, so just go with "small people with a lot of stuff and words.")

Sarah belongs on my list for so many reasons besides the fact that she gets my blog and Twitter password when I die, and we've spent a significant amount of time talking about sports together at Draft Day Suit. She is funny as hell.  (Really.) She has been blogging faithfully for years,  but she's not afraid to try new things and to challenge herself as a writer and, more recently, a photographer. I love hearing that she didn't consider herself a writer before she got into this -- that the medium itself helped her develop these skills and the confidence to pursue it as a personal outlet and as a profession -- because I think that's one of the greatest things about it. 

Oh, and another thing about Sarah: people genuinely like her -- all of the time, everyone. Maybe I shouldn't find this so impressive, but I do. I've also never heard her talk about authenticity, because she doesn't have to. That's why she's my favorite. 

Shannon, aka Mr. Lady, aka Whiskey in My Sippy Cup. 

I was thinking of how to describe Shannon's work and all that keeps coming to me is that every one of her posts is an offering. She's a beautiful writer and a beautifuler soul, a lyrical genius with a sense of humor that will kick your ass and take its name, but maybe give you a hug after. She also takes some pretty pictures, and finds and supports the great work of other writers at StoryBleed. She got the part about it going both ways, how we can serve to feed each others work and not suck the air out of it. So if Shannon likes your post? You'll feel like a beautiful lady Robin Williams just went all Dead Poet's Society on you, that she's standing up on a virtual desk somewhere giving you a high five from the air. And if there's anything that makes your inner writer want to go back out and sit under that tree and keep at it? It's that. It's her. 

She's my blog magnet. If I see a post of hers come up on Twitter or in my reader, I go there immediately, because I know it will make my day better. I pretty much think there's nothing she can't do, and I'm so glad she's my friend. 

(I'm a huge fan.) 

Suebob Davis, Suebob's Red Stapler. 

You may know her by her stapler. Suebob is this good citizen of my corner of the blog world, someone who doesn't seek any kind of spotlight who nonetheless has gained an impressive voice and reach, one conversation, one blog post, one BlogHer at a time. Besides that, I know no one, really, with her kind of compassion and gift of reaching out, in comments, on Twitter, and in person if you're lucky, whenever someone has a problem or an illness or a moment of despair. 

(She probably wouldn't say this is a big deal. I think it's a big deal, so whatever.) 

Her 50 for 50 birthday series just kicked off. In honor of her upcoming birthday, she is featuring that many organizations, talking about what they do and how people can get involved.  Suebob's tendency to tell you exactly who she is and what she cares about was what drew me to her in the first place, so I love that this series will do this for the next couple of months. 

(Suebob has good pictures of the two of us, I think, but I know she'll appreciate this one, because she was there.)  

My fabulous five are pretty different on the surface. But it seems clear that when it comes to bloggers and people in general, I'm drawn to funny, creative, ambitious, impossibly smart people who love words, pictures, their people, and writing all over the internet. This makes perfect sense to me.

Those are mine. Who are yours? 

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Don't forget to enter the 50 Fabulous Wishes contest for a chance to win $1,000 to celebrate a friend with a refreshing attitude about looking and feeling fabulous. I was selected for this Tropicana Trop50 sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do. I received compensation to use and facilitate my post.

Real Rock Science

I am not a rock scientist. Not only am I not a rock scientist, but if there is an opposite of one, I am it.

I failed geology twice in college because (and I am not proud of this but these are the events as they unfolded) I sat in the student union and watched General Hospital and smoked cigarettes when I was supposed to go to class, and then when it came time on an exam to identify the difference between sedimentary rock and those, um, other kinds, I didn't know. So I played the alphabet soup of multiple choice exams that did not have the rock gods working in my favor. Twice.

I even went on the extra credit field trip to Great Falls. Sad. And all kidding aside, this geological failure is one of the many reasons I encourage my female students in particular who show talent and interest in math and science. Those grades are much less painful to discuss 20 years later, and even though my strengths and interests have always been way more skewed towards writing and humanities, it would have been nice to feel a bit more competent in the other stuff. 

Also, igneous! Igneous is another kind of rock. Some of it is still lodged in my brain somewhere.

So when I went down to visit with the Goon Squad and to say hello to their parents in passing and eat their food recently on the first weekend of this season's nice weather, I was a bit concerned when Claudia presented a rock experiment to me and told me that I was going to be her assistant.

I don't recall being asked, is what I'm saying, although telling her I wasn't into rocks just wasn't going to get me out of this enterprise, even if I am totally comfortable telling a five-year-old that my skills are lacking in certain areas. And what I mean by this is that I feel very sorry for anyone who doesn't want to do what Claudia wants them to do, ever, because, well, sorry suckers.

She had procured several rocks from the yard and wanted to put them in a container, with water. The container had to be clear, duh, so she and all other interested parties could see inside. That was pretty much it. She had a few ideas, and - most impressive to me, the typically planless sort who seems to enjoy flailing around from one activity to the other - a clear process in mind that she needed to go through to accomplish it.

This process, of course, required a little help from her mother. She requested a specific size of plastic container, with a lid, and plastic wrap. When Sarah went inside to see what she could find, Claudia leaned over to me conspiratorially and said, "You know, I'm a little worried that she won't have the right supplies." 

Ha. Hahaha. Ha. I didn't get to laugh then, but ha. Hahaha.

Anyway, Mom came through with the stuff and then there was much careful selection of rocks and another trip inside for tongs with which to manipulate the rocks, a task that fell to me because I may not be a rock scientist but I do have larger opposable thumbs and the ability to operate a simple tool so go me! I think she may have even told me that I was doing a good job at one point, a good tactic for motivating the support staff.

And then there was stacking of rocks and finally, oh finally, pouring of water inside to see what the rocks would do.

Turns out what rocks do in this situation is pretty much just sit there, because rocks are heavy and this container was fairly small and there wasn't really enough water to make them float even for a second and it's not like they're going to anyway and oh, there will be time for specific discussions of real geology and physics and chemistry and all of that other stuff that makes my head hurt with people who actually know what they're talking about. (And it's totally fine if you think I'm an idiot now. I started this off basically laying that down, but I'm feeling more stupid as I type so it's totally fine if you do too.)

When it was all over and the lid was on we did end up with a rather fine looking pile of rocks, I'd say. We moved some stuff around and turned it into a pointy, triangular sort of thing. A mini-rock mountain, maybe. And that was good.

There's no gigantic lesson here but what there is in these interactions with children that contrary to belief not all people like me who aren't parents avoid (and actually need to live a full and happy life) is the beauty of a simple act of doing something just because you think it's interesting, of learning how to form an idea that grows out of simple curiosity and with the (really minimal) help of one, maybe two other people around you, to put it into action.

Even if neither of us could explain what was going on in terms that would help us pass an exam, I knew when I was sitting there that I was learning something that had nothing to do with rocks. Maybe it wasn't so much learning as it was remembering what I often forget in a life crowded with overcomplications and repercussions and things done because they have to be and not because they spark any curiosity at all or because they're at all interesting: sometimes it's the most excellent thing to do things to see how they turn out and then you can sit back and say, "I did that" and you move on.

Hypothesis unclear? Results uncertain? That's life. It helps to know how to work with some ambiguity, with whatever supplies you (or your mom, yeah) happen to have on hand.

And if you really have your heart and your mind in the right place, you reach in through murky water to save some of the best rocks from your experiment and put them under the table in your brother's pile because he's having a really bad day.

Because you are a good, wise, compassionate girl, already. Because it amazes me that you already have so much of what you need to live a great and successful life. Because in a way you have learned by strong example and through gifts of nature too, you have the ability to make other people better - in this case a grown-up friend who failed geology once upon a time. 

This post is for my friend Susan, who writes at WhyMommy, and who is back in fighting mode with a bunch of us putting our thoughts and words and love behind her. Thanks to Jean at Stimeyland for arranging the Team WhyMommy Virtual Science Fair. And as usual, to Sarah for letting me borrow one of her children for the occasion.

 

December views from here.

Karen finds beautiful things every day, and I am not shy about telling her that through her words and images I find inspiration.

I stumbled a little post-NaBloPoMo, not sure what to do for December quite yet, and since I've been away from home for a couple of weeks I've been a little more uncentered. This is scary because I'm in a largely uncentered period to begin with. She shared Hippy Urban Girl's December Views project, and I immediately decided to join in. I have a few days to catch up on but I think I can do it. I like the idea of an image a day anyway. I've been doing pretty well with posting photos more consistently and it's more fun to do it with other people.

I'm off to Charlotte to see my other Laurie, another person whose eye I admire and from whom you see all sorts of pretty and just plain awesome things every day. I'm sure I'll share a view or two from there, too.

December 2, catching up:

Billy White, USN

He was the oldest of 18 children and one of several of the boys in his family who left their home on East Capitol Street in Washington, D.C. to serve in the United States Navy during World War II. After he came back he worked as an accountant in the Navy Department (or as my grandmother called it "down at the Navy Yard") for a few decades until a heart attack forced retirement and he spent the rest of his life doing the books for our church and in Annapolis for a state delegate.

I've been lucky to have several models for what I call integrity in my life but he was one of the first and by far one of the few most crucial. He was my father's father, and my father and one of my uncles served in the Navy in Vietnam.

He died in 1988, when I was 17, and I find myself typing this crying like it was yesterday because in a lot of ways it may as well have been.

We who were raised by people who understood how to act and especially how to treat others are lucky for what may have rubbed off.

Saturday Errata

First of all, I just realized that Top Chef premieres Wednesday and it's kind of embarrassing how much I'm looking forward to this. Some people I know and trust to have excellent taste are crazy about Mad Men and given that I've reduced my tv schedule down to approximately nothing else besides CNN, Bones (God I love that show) and The Office I'm a little afraid to watch it once because I'm sure that I'd get just as crazy. Also I have never seen True Blood. Don't talk to me about it, please. I can't add anything else to my already epic procrastination files, not a thing.

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In the "intentions for the universe" department, I went to an art show at an oppressively hot D.C. gallery on Friday night. It was mixed media but a lot of it was photography. I think I could put some of my own stuff out there, judging from what I saw. Some of it is way better than mine, some of it is just, eh, I'll admit I thought "Wow, I have some pictures that can kick that picture's ass." (I immediately feel guilty about that and want to erase it. I'm not going to. Go ahead. Judge me.) Anyway, I think I might try. If I write it down maybe I'll actually do it.

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I guest-posted on Greeblemonkey yesterday because I love Aimee and she asked and honestly I was totally flattered that she asked. I ended up rambling on about a Dave Matthews Band show I went to with her last summer when I was in Denver for the DNC, and Duran Duran discussions with Sarah and her and other matters related to music and making friends on the Internet who you totally would have been friends with if you had met them in real life first. The Internet - and the  blogging community I happen to hang out in - came in quite handy in these cases.

This is Aimee and me at that show. I love that she included this photo and thank her in advance for letting me share it here. I'm not sure why I look like I'm crying, or maybe stoned, because no, neither. At least I don't remember crying. Maybe I was overcome with Internet friendship, or altitude. I worked so hard that week and my D90 was stolen and I fell unceremoniously in a street in downtown Denver when I was hanging out with my girl Heather C. and also lost my press pass (I'm not kidding when I say I need a minder) so this night out with Aimee was pretty much the highlight, second only to being in Invesco/Mile High Stadium when President Obama accepted the nomination - a first place that she would understand better than almost anyone.)

Note: Aimee will come and pick you up on a street corner after you've met her one time and take you to dinner and to the amazing Red Rocks, if you call her and ask her and throw in a show ticket. Total score.

She also included this shot of Sarah and me that I'll put here again just because I can and I want it on my blog too, yo.

Sarah makes me look good in general. I first recall meeting her for real while attempting to slice my finger off in a door at BlogHer DC last fall. (If this was not the first time I'm sorry, it's like you've always been here dude what can I say? ;)) This didn't bode well for good pictures but we've had a run of good luck since then. I can't make her stand next to me all the time which is a shame. This photo - especially notable because it was way past wine o'clock and my eyes are still open - was taken by Laurie Smithwick, another friend who makes the best kind in real life because she makes me think better and makes me smile big. 

Oh, what the hell. It's Laurie and me. Lauries, even.

I like you guys, all y'all. I keep threatening (like, myself, in my own brain) to do a really late BlogHer post and maybe I will. This year was good.

Haha, Denise, look! I wrote "really late BlogHer post" and I actually meant the conference but that is such an honestly ambiguous statement. May this new leaf turn over with reckless abandon.

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The post I wrote for Aimee is largely about music. And somewhat related, I'm currently stalking archives because as stated above I have these friends now from the computer and I'm realizing how much of their actual blogs I've missed over my past three years of failing at reading blogs (or because I didn't really know them well yet so it wasn't technically my fault. Deflect, deflect! Also I could link like 20 more people which I probably should if I'm going to do it at all but I can't take the pressure. You know who you are.) I am forcing myself to sit still for much of today because I'm fried, and therefore just read a list of Sarah's top 100 albums that she wrote three years ago (do not go back and read it Sarah because you might start arguing with yourself. Leave it alone.)

Sarah and I have some things in common so it's not so surprising that large parts of her music category, in fact, (minus some of the kids' stuff with which I'm not familiar because I just have no reason to turn it on most of the time although I'm essentially a child, and the death metal because I just never went there in spite of my obsession with hair and harder, albeit mainstream, metal) are right out of my life. I'm kind of tempted to try my own list but the thought is so daunting that I'm trying to talk myself out of it, and I'd have to follow the honesty rule and frankly I like some really embarrassing shit. Let's just say reading this made me want to write about music more. I'll probably start with this a little later, just for grins. Maybe you should too.

I really do love archives, which I actually don't think is so weird. I read Eden Kennedy's and Wendy McClure's sometimes just because the writing is so good and it doesn't get old for me. I'll take inspiration where I can get it.

And on a few key points that I'll mention here, Sarah, so I can embarrass myself on my own blog rather than going back and obsessively commenting on three-year-old posts: You said "counterpoint structure in rock music" and I have no idea what that means so I'm glad there are people like you who do; Night Songs is the far superior record for Somebody Save Me and Nobody's Fool alone, although Coming Home is one of my favorite songs of all time and I think I might write about a recent interaction with it next; Soundgarden is one of the greatest bands ever and this is why I despise my ex-boyfriend Chris Cornell all the more for the travesty of his recent inexcusable solo material wherein he managed to remind me of Cher; I'm confused however by your omission of Temple of the Dog; none of Simon LeBon's lyrics make sense, except in Save a Prayer, marginally, and props to you for bonding with the first record because it's by far the best besides "New Religion" and "Last Chance on the Stairway" on Rio which win for (naturally) bass lines alone; I'd like a world with Cliff Burton, Shannon Hoon (my personal addition), Kurt Cobain and Layne Staley still in it. At the very least I feel confident that Cliff would have saved the world from the Napster hearings and the documentary where the band went through group therapy; more people should have always listened to the Cult because some of their stuff is genius, Fire Woman alone, good Lord, and Blood Sugar Sex Magic and Appetite = totally in my top ten, BSSM might have to be 1 or 2. Ten is in the top 15. Also Ramble On is my favorite Zeppelin song and on my top-ten favorite songs ever list as well. And I'll stop there. We are both very smart people with excellent taste, in my own mind. The end.

I could have e-mailed that but I really think my Chris Cornell rage needs to be shared with a wider audience. Bottom line? This archive-stalking really saves a lot of catch-up time.

(Also I'm using the word "stalk" facetiously here. Real, creepy stalking is not funny or appealing at all in the slightest. Don't make me tell you how in-depth my site stats are. Really, because I don't want to talk about it. Moving on. Lalala.)

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Finally, because my mother is making me leave my house to go see Julie and Julia, a book I disliked for much the same reasons that I disliked Eat, Pray, Love (I know. I'm not a real person, and also clearly not a girl either. Bring on the hate, bring it.) and a movie I'm not too excited to see either but she is and I'm curious in a voyeuristic sort of way about how blogging will be portrayed so I'm going, I want this. Badly.

I just got my time capsule e-mail from Photojojo.com, and they sell it through their site (in the "awesomeness" category in their store. I concur.) I've had a combined camerabag/purse for a number of months now because I take my SLR everywhere - hi robbers please don't follow me and steal it, I'm scrappy and hard to pin down anyway, always on the move, yes - and it's fraying on the edges and generally making me look like the crazy camera bag lady, so I needed something cute and functional and this totally scores.

You should get the Time Capsule too. Connect it to your Flickr account and twice a month they e-mail you with a bunch of images that you uploaded exactly a year ago. It's very cool. If you're a nostalgia junkie like me it fits that bill plus it reminds me of pictures I'd completely forgotten about. The only sad part is they sent me photos of my dog after he died and I was in a crappy mood and it kind of made me cry to see him pop up in my e-mail and I'm sure the same will happen with my grandma but whatever, it's still a genius idea and I support it completely. I'm sure they've been waiting for me to weigh in on it, so there it is.

He was cute though.

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I think that's more than enough from me. Make it a great day.

Purple for Maddie and Much Love for Thalon

Cross-posted at BlogHer.

"So shines a good deed in a weary world," Shakespeare wrote in The Merchant of Venice. Gene Wilder repeated it in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The line jumped out at me when I watched it for the millionth time on Sunday, reminding me of the community of parent bloggers, friends and allies who reached out this week to support two families who suffered the unthinkable loss of their babies.

The funeral of Maddie Spohr, 17-month old daughter of Heather and Mike Spohr of The Spohrs Are Multiplying and The Newborn Identity, is today in California. Thalon, the 16-month-old son of Shana of Gorillabuns, died this weekend.

I honestly do not know where to begin to sum up the online and in some cases very much in-person reaction from thousands of bloggers, because I know I can't, but I feel it bears mentioning. There is so much - SO MUCH - out there, a tremendous outpouring from people all over the Internet who care about these children and the people who have lost them that it's struck me silent. And while my heart and brain are full, I've been doing basically everything I can all of yesterday and today to avoid writing about the deaths of two small children, even though it was the only thing that seemed important enough to write about this week. I've watched post after post flow from the fingers of people all over this continent (and likely the world, if you've seen posts from beyond North American borders please link them in the comments.) And I've been reading them obsessively, amazed at people who can so readily find the words, at people who are responding to these losses with so much generosity and kindness, who are donating to the March of Dimes in Maddie's memory, who are traveling to California for her funeral to stand with and support her parents, who are turning their avatars and blogs purple in her memory. (Thanks much to Velma for helping me out with mine.)

Last night I ended up stuck on Bejeweled, a horribly addictive game that kills one lobe of your brain with stupidity while it frees the other one up to think about more important things, because I haven't been able to slow my brain down enough to knit this all together in a clean white text box. And after I couldn't do that anymore, I was ready to try to write about it, because even though I know for sure I can't do two baby lives and the immeasurable pain of two families justice, I need to talk about what happens when people all over the world come to care, consider themselves community, and have the technological means combined with the oh-so-human heart and spirit to do something about it.

I'm going to mostly let these people speak, but first of all, the facts, in case anyone reading missed them: Maddie died on April 8, 2009. Born 11 weeks premature two years ago, she had health issues throughout her life but had been doing well until the infection set in that took her life. Mom Heather and dad Mike wrote about their experiences parenting her, from the difficulties of prematurity and NICU to the everyday joys of watching her grow. Mike was a stay-at-home dad for much of Maddie's life. They are both on Twitter, Heather at @mamaspohr and Mike, @newbornidentity.

Shana's son, Thalon Bruce, died suddenly on Saturday.She shared the news yesterday.

There are countless communities on the Internet, with amorphous boundaries, knit loosely together in a global sense but with some of the tightest human relationships I've ever seen. The parent blogging community has been deconstructed in detail, but when it comes to losses like this, the rate and speed of organizing is remarkable. There's the ability of a stranger like myself, not a parent but certainly with the compassion for the inexplicable loss of a baby, to send a comment or an e-mail, to get sucked into the most beautiful pair of seventeen month-old eyes, and to cry for people I've never met because reading the accounts of their daughter's life are almost too much to bear. And if I feel this way? Who could imagine their grief.

In comments and on their own blogs, people reach out. And as usual anymore, Twitter is a communications hub, so intrinsic to online community building that I fail to engage when someone questions the value. You get it or you don't.

Still - human beings have to hit these keys and make the plans, and that is what has happened in both of these instances. Meghan at a Mom Two Boys is the kind of friend I hope I'd have on my side in a situation like this. She originally announced her loss on behalf of the family, has been instrumental in fundraising efforts, and has a For Maddie hub on her blog with links to (currently) 410 posts submitted by bloggers in her honor. March for Maddie has more, including videos and photos.

Lotus Carroll at Sarcastic Mom also has a page with every conceivable Maddie link, including the 50 teams who will be walking in her honor in the March of Dimes March for Babies in a couple of weeks. Donations to Maddie's March of Dimes page are over $25,000 so far (it's often down due to volume, so a trip to Sarcastic Mom's links are the best bet, I've found.)

The women of Room 704 (or, more recently, Seven-Oh-Spohr) are selling bracelets with the bulk of the proceeds going to the Spohr family. Yvonne of Joy Unexpected went out and bought a Nikon Coolpix camera instead of directly donating. Every ten dollars donated to the family gains donors one chance at the camera. Instamom is doing the same with a Nintendo DSi.

Bloggers including Mrs. Schmitty will be posting a photo of Madeline from this post at 2:30 p.m., PST today to coincide with her service. The For Maddie Flickr pool includes purple balloon launches and people wearing purple.

Shana's friend Sarah at Whoorl set up a Love for Thalon PayPal link, alongside her post about his loss.

Thalon passed away yesterday afternoon surrounded by his adoring family.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention wanting to punch the universe in the mouth right now. Really hard.

Heather B. met Thalon in January.

After the last two weeks I keep shaking my head because babies should never die. It’s not right and it’s the most fucked up thing I have ever heard. And yet it keeps happening and all I want to do is sit here in my pajama pants and wonder why? None of the above makes any sense. And I don’t even care. I’m just torn up on the inside and questioning how parents do it. How do you spend the rest of your life constantly worrying that in any minute your heart might break into a million pieces? None of the above makes sense because it shouldn’t. It - the death of a child - shouldn’t happen but it does.

Twitter searches for Maddie and Thalon are updated in real time.

The LA Times ran a story about the online response to Maddie's death. Heather Spohr will speak at her daughter's funeral.

The comments for both of these babies are countless, but this one from Flicka sums up what many feel:

Saying that I am so sorry seems woefully inadequate right now. My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family, now and in the days ahead. This internet stranger is hugging you from afar.

Kate from SweetSalty left one on this beautiful photo of Maddie:

Everyone's twittering and blogging and remembering and I'm just completely and totally stunned. Had to come here and see her. My god, she was some kind of imp or sprite or otherworldly girl.

I've spent almost two years reconciling the mysteries of what else is out there, having a 6-week-old premature son who is on that other side, and has all those answers. And yet I look at Maddie's gorgeous face and all over again, I can't make sense of it.

Maggie's post at Okay. Fine. Dammit is beautiful. Genius apparently causes blog crashes, because I can't get there now, but it says everything I wanted to but can't find the words.

Eight hours in the car today and I kept checking Twitter on my phone, and I swear for the first time ever I’m not annoyed by hashtags, I’m seeking them out, the #maddie’s, the #thalon’s, like beacons, and it’s so strange, isn’t it? In times of great confusion and profound tragedy we just want to be among others who are equally impacted, like after Columbine or September 11, and so this is what we do, we head to the chapels and the temples and the public parks and the malls and we shuffle together slowly, as one, taking comfort in the lull of the sound of our communal footsteps and that’s really what the blogosphere has become to me, you know? And everyone was there today, following the hashtags, each tweet and post a gonging of the bell, the Church of Twitter.

Forget about weary. The world ought to really lie down exhausted every time a baby dies, but then if it did it would never get up. It happens all the time, every day, all over the world. But every time, it seems like time ought to stop and remember.In the loss of these children, there is compassion for all children, for all families who lose them. There is not much more to say than that, except for whatever it's worth - which I'm not sure how to quantify but what do you do in situations like this other than things that seem like they might help, like they might have meaning? - I will wear purple today. And if there were a color for Thalon, if one pops up soon, I'll do that too. It's the least I can do for these kids and for their families.

Please feel free to share remembrances, updates and links to posts in the comments. I write at LaurieWrites. I will walk in the suburban Maryland March for Babies on April 25, in honor of Maddie, who joins the kids with cleft lips and palates who I will always walk for. Please visit my page if you feel so moved, and pitch in for all of these kids. Thanks. This is a particularly meaningful year.

SXSW Smiles and Photo Dreams - What's Yours?

Cross-posted at BlogHer, with a few additions here.

As a photographer and an adult with a cleft lip and palate who had a transformative experience shooting an Operation Smile dental mission in Vietnam a year ago this week, I was thrilled to see the SXSW Smiles project at the huge SXSW Interactive conference in the oh-so-awesome Austin.

Well, I didn't actually see it. I almost missed it entirely. I walked out of my last panel on the last day smack into a table that had piles of Operation Smile stickers and buttons on it (I was tired, and it turns out when you buy an iPhone you can spend a lot of stupid time looking at the ground.) It kind of hurt my knee, but it got my attention. And after a little bit of research into the project that brought a nonprofit organization like this one to a huge tech conference, I kicked myself harder than usual for not paying attention before. There's a lot to pay attention to at this conference, but this is one more thing that given my love for this organization's mission of providing surgical repair for facial differences - primarily cleft lips and/or palates - around the world, I feel like the universe should have put in my scattered, hurried path. (And the universe is like, "Hi, pay attention to the important stuff, thanks.") So I am now, and I hope you will too.

Renee Alexander Hamilton, Operation Smile's Social Media Strategist who represented the project at SXSW Interactive, tells the story on her blog, SXSW Smiles Journal.

-I told her about my new role and how now I am trying to do the same thing we do in Donor Relations online and in person at events. I explained that while in the past social networking tools like chat rooms were thought to divide people and keep them at home in a dark corner having "virtual relationships'. Now with Facebook and Twitter, these interactions are actually driving in-person meet-ups and beyond that they are inspiring ACTION.

So I guess you could say I'm in Austin for a little Smile Action!

SXSW Smiles set up shop outside the very cool Beacon Lounge for nonprofits and social change organizations in the Austin Convention Center, with the goal of enough donations for 10 new "smiles" - repair surgeries for kids with cleft lips and/or palates- each estimated at $240.

Directions were simple. First, pick up or download a "Make Me Smile" sign, and write whatever makes you smile on it. Upload a photo of yourself with the sign to Flickr with the "sxswsmiles" tag. Donate by texting "smile" to 90999, or dropping it off in the Beacon Lounge.

Check out the Operation Smile SXSW Flickr set here, hosted on Alexander aka Entropy Art's photostream. The answers are fun to read - "Bhangra," "our absurdly clingy dog", "hot salsa"- and you'll also get a peek at some of the folks roaming the halls of SXSW, if that's a draw. I would include them for you here, but "all rights reserved" is what it is.

The SXSWSmiles project is part of a larger $240 Smile Challenge March (aka Smile Month.) The cause's Facebook page says that $4203 has been donated so far and $3710 is still needed to reach their goal of providing 20 repair surgeries to children. Check it out.

While this is so much on my mind, Lenovo Microsoft is asking people to "Name Your Dream Assignment," asking "Where will your lens take you?" on a photo project for which they will give a prize of $50,000, a video camera, a blog and a computer to record it all. I haven't entered, but mine? To go on a mission - a surgical one this time, and to shoot it. I don't know when or how this will happen, but I believe that it will, and just as I felt in Vietnam, I think it'll be one of the most important things I ever witness.

And why? I'm as idealistic as I am hardcore about photography, and that's a lot. Photos can change lives, I will boldly, idealistically, perhaps overdramatically say - whether they're photos of people talking about what makes them smile or, maybe more importantly, photos taken before and after cleft lip and/or palate repair. No pictures exist of me prior to my lip repair at six weeks old. Hospitals didn't take photos of babies with facial differences then. I'm not sure what the deal was in my family, honestly - I do know my mother was never ashamed of me, in fact saw beyond my flaws as mothers most often do. Who knows what pressures existed on a 20-year-old woman and a 22-year-old man, in the days before cameras were omnipresent, everywhere, where images were immediately available.

But photos are essential and I wish there were some. I would love to see what I looked like before this repair, to see the reality of this situation that has affected my life like no other. And I like seeing the impact a simple repair surgery can make on a child who may otherwise walk around in their impoverished town or village with a gaping whole where there ought not to be one. Photos can inform and change perceptions and raise awareness just like, and sometimes even more than, words can. It can be difficult to see if you're unaccustomed, but just like with many things that present challenges that can't be easily solved, or aren't so pretty, or disturb on some level, they don't go away just because we don't pay attention.

When its in a picture in front of your face, it's hard to ignore, so may there always be pictures of important things in front of our faces.

Me, exhausted, at the end of a harrowing trip, happy nonetheless to be spending time with the very important kids at Hanoi Medical University, March, 2008. Many had just received their first dental exam. Photo kindly taken by their teacher. (The whole set is here. I love these pictures.)

And I can easily say that Operation Smile is my favorite new Twitter contact from SXSW Interactive.

Other photo dreamers for this and other causes:

Joanne Bamberger/PunditMom's dream assignment is to tell the stories of moms keeping their families afloat in tough economic times.

Katie Ring's Photography and Life blog with footage of Operation Smile patients in India and her photos of a mission there.

Audra, an American expat writing at Nicaragua: The Obandos accompanied her students from the American Nicaraguan School on an Operation Smile mission

Beth Kanter was a fixture in the Beacon Lounge and wrote prolifically about the nonprofit presence at SXSW and in social media communities. Her post on the Social Media Nonprofit ROI Poetry Slam is a good place to start, but scroll around for lots more. <

It's all around me.

Gwen Bell is inspiring. I haven't read her for some reason but I went from link to link and finally settled in to find out that I love her writing.

It is the lovely Jen Lemen's birthday today. She wrote this post about turning 40 and all she plans to do to commemorate it this year. I read it this morning and my heart sang for her and for me because I'm totally stealing this idea.

I've been sitting in the bookstore today reading and writing, trying to step outside the lines that have been drawing themselves in tighter and tighter around me. It's been a good mental and physical break from a life that's moving too fast all of a sudden and still presenting me with some challenges.Two-and-a-half months to graduation and there are so many questions I have that have no answer and yet I find myself gravitating more and more towards trust where in recent months there has been such uncertainty.

Lunch with an old friend today restored something in me that I didn't know was in need of it, really. It helped me write something I needed to get out, which was good - so often lately I've felt blocked. It helped me see my way clear to forgiveness, to putting something positive and of actual value into the universe. Actually I'm rediscovering all of these people from all along the path of my life - from high school and other times where maybe we needed a break or didn't really need one but it happened anyway. Add that to some tremendous new people who have come into my life in the past year and I feel that for all the things I'm afraid I lack, I have an embarrassment of riches in friends, which is so wonderful to know. I really can't overstate it.

My dear old friend K and I sat down over beers this weekend after three years of a fractured relationship and it's so great to know that with some people you can just pick up wherever you - for whatever reason - left off.

Then today I looked at a woman I last knew as a 16 year old girl and even though it had been 20 years there was so much that we still inherently knew about each other and there was so little back story that needed to be explained. Turns out we've lived really close to each other for years and it just needed this kind of time to reconnect, I guess. Last night someone I never thought would own anything in common with me at all set up some dinner plans and that was really nice too.

I don't know what the confluence of all of this means at this point - and I don't think I'm going to think about it too deeply for awhile. I'm just going to enjoy it since there's so much of life not to enjoy and what I'm focusing on is connection with good people.

I'll just add that it might not be useful to knock the good stuff that Facebook can do for you until you've tried it - you know, if you want to.

The fall light and colors are inside of me as they are every year. It's an amazing time to be alive - somewhere on the edge of melancholy, but not quite there. I'm not dreading winter as I usually do so much. It'll just happen and I'll move through it as usual. If I didn't have to drive in bad weather I really don't think I'll care. My mother asked if I was going anywhere for graduation and the truth is probably not but maybe I ought to. 

Now I'm listening to Hem, and to a little bit of Wilco. I'm checking the totals and hoping people donate to the Life Through a Lens project. I figure if I had kids by now I'd have hit my family up for thousands of dollars in wrapping paper and school candy bars so maybe we can just cobble together this $800 for these kids and call it even. At least I hope so.

I feel good today. I feel inspired today. I feel like maybe things can sometimes be good and I feel slightly more capable of letting go of things that weight me down than usual, which is to say that I actually do feel capable. And that does feel good, I have to say.

Covered in roses

Today started with an excellent breakfast at Dottie's Bluebird Cafe (I think?) in downtown San Francisco with my BlogHer roommate Genie and the excellent Jen Zug who was a fellow reader at the Community keynote Friday night. We spent the hour wait in the gray damp morning talking about nothing and everything in between and decided it was worth it when the food came. Wow. Best breakfast, really, that I'd wait for again, which generally speaking isn't the case.

After breakfast Genie had taken off for the airport and I stuck around in the room to check my e-mail and try to arrange transportation to San Diego from San Francisco, a task I thought would be stunningly easy. Cue the Westin kicking me off the wireless when the BlogHer "FREE" bizness stopped almost exactly at noon. Then cue me trying desperately to cram two weeks' worth of crap into two suitcases, while the "what to keep" pile of stuff I was bringing home from the conference got smaller and smaller.

Suitcases closed, I arranged my camera and purse and whatever other detritus of my life stood between me and a life beyond the Westin walls, when a wave of horrible emptiness came over me and I began to weep. I'd had a dream about my ex-boyfriend and his new girlfriend (whom I do not know and will never, by the way? So, weird?) in the early morning hours. I felt suddenly, overwhelmingly sad. BlogHer was great and powerful like Oz for me this year, and it was over. I missed my family. I hadn't seen enough of the city. And most of all, I was oh so VERY all alone in this hotel room and thus it would ever be. I really really lost my shit there for a minute, and as a result had absolutely no idea what to do next.

What I did was somehow manage to pile all the junk into a set-up that I could stumble downstairs with, stopped crying after a few minutes, and went out to the elevators. And when the elevator doors opened up, there was my dear BlogHer co-editor Catherine Morgan and her mom, smiling big smiles and inviting me to run around the city with them to do some last-minute shopping and sea-lion watching and whatnot. Catherine and I connected at last year's conference and I'm in touch with a number of my BlogHer girls (as I call them in my head, where it is neither inappropriate nor reductive, by the way. ;)) every day. She stuck with me today as I realized that a $350 rental car return fee in San Diego wasn't going to cut it, and worked with my quiet hysteria while I tried to arrange alternative transportation. She and her sweet mom Frances listened to me babble on at lunch, and by the time I left them at the sea lions to go meet two other really great women who had stuck around, who I felt comfortable reaching out to for some company and support even though I didn't know them very well at all until tonight, I felt - if not completely settled with the weirdness of the day and every single conflicting emotion that seems to bookend everything for me these days - at least grateful that I'd had that time with people I liked and cared about. At least I wasn't crying anymore, In fact,  the crazy sea lion barking made me laugh out loud and that's definitely preferable to the weeping.

This kind of experience is what I really love the most about what BlogHer has brought to my life in the past three years and what makes me go all warm and fuzzy about it like I don't about many, many things, trust me. I'd call it out if it wasn't true and when parts of it don't work for me I do that too. But the stark truth is that very few things in my life have given me the chance to not only get better at the writing but also to connect with people in these really astounding ways. It's an experience that takes me up really really way high sometimes. It can have me stupid in the street at 4 a.m. with people I've just met. It makes me laugh and talk and eat and drink and think and cry when it's over.

Which it is. And I am finally getting the hell out of here.