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What Presidents Both Dead and Alive Tell Me About the Future of Social Media

Wonder where social media is going? Ask our Founding Fathers.

ThirdAge Blog Carnival is at The New Charm School

Jennifer Warwick has graciously taken on the last stop of the ThirdAge Carnival in 2005.

Of course, stop in for all the goodies, but also take a moment to check out Jennifer's site. I stumbled upon Charm School early this year and found a kindred soul who sees the personal and professional as the same thing. She infuses her posts with her personal experience and sass. I love it!

In Memory of Progenitor: 1945-2005

I remember back to September 2004, when I first started writing this blog. A few people read it, mostly people I knew, and they commented more about me writing the blog than the blog itself. I hadn't found my stride yet. I wrote about the exercise gym chain Curves and my issues with Dell, but a lot of my career angst and issues with corporate life were still corked.

Finally I wrote my first series about the corporate world--Paralyzed: Life of the Mid-Level Career Woman. I felt expressed and rather satisfied with myself. My greatest fan, my mother, wrote, referring to my blog, "It just gets better and better..." I thought, even though commenters were still unrealistically positive and related to me, I was doing quite well.

But then I got my first negative comment. One that very well may be my worst one ever, regarding the angst I expressed about being a single woman in the corporate world:

"Whining doesn't become you. You lead a life that is the envy of your peers. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and you took the one less travelled by..... and it HAS made all the didderence [sic]."

I didn't see the good in this message. I figured it was an old boss, or someone that I worked with who thought I was a complainer. The word "Whiner" always struck me as an insult--I never saw the implied compliment of being in a position of seeing things from a stance much more privileged than others. Though I am a whiner, I always saw myself as more of an observer of all things personally troubling--a very big distinction in my mind.

This being my first negative comment, I wondered whether I should delete the damn thing or be bold and leave it there. I did what I always do when I wanted unconditional praise and support; I called my mother.

"Did you read the blog today?" I asked.

"No--did you post something new?"

"The comments, Mom! The comments! Did you see what was written about me? I think this person may know me!"

My mother read the comment and then laughed,

"Well, of course this person KNOWS you, Hun! It's your father!"

Next Stop for the ThirdAge Carnival: Crossroads Dispatches

Yoohoooooo! Where's the ThirdAge Blog Carnival now? Over at Evelyn's Place. Check it out, and for a list of the upcoming venues click here.

The Adults in the Room

My dad is sick. Real sick.

People ask me, how couldn't he know he was sick? He's lost 80 pounds in six months and hasn't had an appetite. And I tell them, "You don't know my Dad," and I explain how he has found it a point of pride that he hasn't been to a doctor in over 35 years. He used to boast that it was a sign of his robust health.

Of course, we knew that wasn't true. My father has chain smoked since he was a teenager, often eschewing engagements where he couldn't light up. He could never sneak up on people, his labored breathing gave him away. He never complained about it; it just became part of him, like his smoky clothes and deep, resonating voice (he's moonlighted as a commercial announcer). My siblings and I learned to make a joke of it, when we heard him sauntering into the room, slowly drawing breath in, then out, one of us often said, "Here comes Darth. May the force be with you."

ThirdAge Launches a Blog Carnival

Come one, come all! Come all who appreciate things Baby Boomer. No, I'm not officially a Baby Boomer, but I like to play one on TV, and on the phone, when I use my adult voice to sound older than I look. I was told a few years ago that I was a 47-year-old trapped in a 27-year-old's body. I basically sweat the stuff of someone approaching midlife. I suppose I like to be prepared.

So it stands to reason that I edit the ThirdAge Blog, a collection of some of my favorite blog writers, and have the privilege of launching the ThirdAge Blog Carnival, which adds a few more. I managed to get the likes of Elisa Camahort at Hip and Zen Pen, Evelyn Rodriguez, Troy Worman, Jennifer Warwick, Janeen Armstrong, Marilyn from California Fever, Steve Sherlock, and, of course, the ThirdAge bloggers to cough up some kickass content on work, health, money, relationships, culture and life.

Check it out here.

Want to submit or post to our carnival? Check out the details here.

The Lessons of Katrina: Conserve! And Keep Marshmallows On-Hand

I received my PG&E bill the other day and my mouth dropped--it was double what it was last month. What did we do this month that was so different? It's not any colder outside. I don't recall anyone leaving on any lights...

I checked our rates. Electricity is still fairly cheap, but gas has skyrocketed! To that point, I can't fill up the lil Ol' Jetta for less than $40. You'd think I drove a Lexus or something.

Needless to say (and before our Dear President, in such quick response to the effects of Katrina, suggested it today), we've been strategizing ways of scaling back on gas. B-friend, who insists on feeding his WRX with premium fuel, has been riding his bike everywhere. And if he really needs a car, he suggests I drive. What a citizen.

The Question Posed by Katrina: Hang on or Let Go?

I received a moving note from Christien yesterday--a reader that I never knew was based in the South. Never thought to ask, as typically I'm more interested in psychographics than geographics when it comes to my blog buddies. He wrote, regarding my dinky little post on Hurricane Katrina:

"jory

you helped. i was reading your blog while stuck in tx during the few days after the storm. no one would turn off the horrible national news coverage. i'd escape to a room and read some blogs. ... i'm trying to keep up with my own accounts of what my fam is going through on my blog. it's nuts. kind of like there is no word stronger than love but you search for one. this is the same thing on the oppostie end of the spectrum..."

Help the Victims of Hurricane Katrina

I'm not much of a praying type, but I found myself praying as best I knew how--more like meditating on the vision of a city submerged in water, imagining people getting plucked out of the depths and brought out into the light. Times like these I feel downright helpless and, frankly guilty.

I don't have family in that part of the country, but I spent the morning reading reports in the Times about how horrible the whole situation is, from the overall devastation to the atrocities faced by the displaced folks living in the Superdome.

I like Jill Fallon's post on ThirdAge on how you can help from your dry little corner of the earth.

Katrina Hurricane Katrina

In Defense of HIStory and BlogHERcon

Back to my Monday blog topic before I was so rudely interrupted by my PC.

I'm amused by all of the brouhaha between the guys and the girls. This issue has heated up in both the print and online realms, with discussion over the alleged blogger gender divide and lack of female political commentary in major metropolitan newspapers.

I'm split over this debate, the woman in me fearing the evolution of one of women's only free playgrounds into a Boys Club, the realist in me knowing that, ultimately, people gravitate toward GOOD CONTENT, regardless of who wrote it.