Letter #20 - A blue-grey kind of day.

A lot of blank space here... gives you time to think about all the things we miss that we can't fit through the wires.

I find myself sometimes staring at the screen wondering what exactly I am looking for here... as if there is something, somewhere on this vast internet, that will somehow fill the void or numb the feeling or enlighten my bored mind.  Maybe if I google the meaning of life or somehow stumble across the perfect most inspiring blog then suddenly everything will fall into place! 

But really what I need in these moments are all the friends who have moved far away, and who knew me all those years ago when I wasn't a mother or a teacher or a wife.  Sometimes I just need to sit with them and remember when we would sit on the roof and drink tea and look at the stars... or be reminded of when I woke up in the rain, yet in my bed, on one of my first nights as Christina's roomie...  or the time I came home and she was sitting on her bed sobbing amongst a huge pile of clothes on the floor.  I was so astonished to see anything out of place that I didn't know if I should ask her what happened to her CLOTHES or what happened to her, and in the end I don't think I asked anything at all, just sat there and waited for the story to unfold. 

What I really need in these moments isn't an email or even a phone call, I need a jet plane to fly me off to Toronto or Montreal or Calgary or Nashville!  But you know what seems to be the next best thing?  A letter.  A piece of frail paper fed into my Olympia de Luxe, typed out from the heart, and put in the mail where it will be received in 2 days or maybe 17 days... depending on the weather, the distance, and the mood of Canada Post that week.  And when that dear friend gets it in the mail, she might be changing diapers or drowning in laundry or sitting staring at her own screen wondering what she needs... and there will be a glimpse of the past, a note from a faraway friend who misses her dearly and still remembers the little things we did together.

A picture snapped in Halifax on Michael & Christina's honeymoon

Letter #18 - Too wired for their own good?

Are we too wired for our own good?  I won't write much on this either... as the article you just read was fairly lengthy.  I will say that as a mother I worry that my not-yet-three year old son knows how to navigate Youtube and that my one year old wants nothing more but to play with my phone.  As a teacher, I see my students every single day literally stuck to their smart phones.  When they think I'm not looking they sneak a look at facebook or quickly write a text.  If there is a lull in class they immediately plug in their headphones.  They do not want me to do examples with them on the overhead because they just like looking at things on the digital projector... they would rather be passively observing some digitalized version of what I am explaining to them in real words and symbols that they can tangibly see and hear.  It does worry me because I can see that their ability to concentrate has shortened from only a decade or so ago when I was in high school.  It also worries me because they are addicted to the constant information being put out there for them to see.  When I was in high school we had to dial-up to connect to the internet and the noise it made was so loud my parents knew everytime I was going online.  They got an internet bill each month saying how many hours had been used, and if we went over I had some answers to give.  Plus, even though we were connected to social sites like MSN Messanger and ICQ, our access was limited by the sheer physicality of accessing a computer.  So even if we were addicted we had to limited our screen time because we simply could not spend all day sitting at our computers.  Today's kids face a different world... one which we will have to learn to navigate sooner or later!

Letter #4 - Lost and Returned! (and the passing of a dear family friend)

  

 

Included in this letter was a write-up on a very influencial man in Vancouver, Milton Wong, who had recently passed away.  Here is the clipping of the article, with apologies for how it is divided - newspapers are not easily scanned - they are so big!

 

Even though I did not know Milton Wong, I felt a pang of sadness that it took me a whole month to hear of his passing.  I couldn't help but imagine a time not too long ago when loved ones would go overseas, or even just to another part of the country, and news of an illness or death might not reach you until it was too late, certainly not in time to book a last minute flight to visit in the hospital or attend a funeral.  In moments like this I am thankful for technology. 

If you had a difficult time reading the article click here.

Letter #15 - A Lovely Postcard!

 

Letter #12 & 14: Bumps in the Road

 

The Idiocity of the Masses (or why are Yahoo! Answers so stupid?)

This one really struck a chord.  If there is one thing I cannot stand it is internet pollution... you know, all those sites that were written by random people who know nothing or next-to-nothing about their topic all writing articles to hopefully make $0.05 if someone clicks on their link to Amazon.com or wherever.  I absolutely hate it!!  Search Engine Optimization drives me crazy.  I like it in theory, because in THEORY it means that the quality information should come to the top of your search, and maybe most of the time it does... but then there are all those other times when you google something and get page after page of USELESS filler text designed to get you to click on an ad.  ARGH!  (I think you all get the point... I really don't like this.  If you write these articles for the web, well, at least now I don't have to explain to you why I think that your job is bordering on unethical in an intellectual way.)

So that brings us to today's article which had me in stitches!!  "Like bubbles rising to the top of the septic tank..."  I LOVE THIS ARTICLE!!

Driving Under the Influence... of Facebook!

Letter 24 -

First page... lost in cyberspace!  Not really, but on another computer... argh

Letter #12: Filing Stories without the Internet, No Simple Task

Page 1: (missing)

Dear Marisa, 

Today you get pretty paper! I wanted to typewrite this letter to you but something went wrong with my Smith-Corona yesterday and it is all wonky. I'll do my best to write neatly. I haven't written any of these letters on the computer because there's the tendency to edit and then I over-think what I am trying to say. So, I find the pen or typewriter best.

There is no question that the Internet is an incredible tool. I had hoped to file two articles before the fast began but I didn't finish them (in one case, start) before I went off-line on January 1. Both were due January 15. So, in my true deadline-loving nature...

Letter #13: I Love Typewriters!

Today's thoughts are brought to you by the font Courier, because it looks like a 1970's typewriter.  

I do love typewriters... I really do!  I especially love receiving mail typed on a lovely typewriter.  I love how the typos make it look like someone really typed it... not just a machine auto-correcting your spelling as you go.  I love how once you think something and type those keys it is on the page for all to see.  You can't edit once you have written - you can only go back and xxxxxx over the words you do not want, leaving obvious scars on your work.

Somehow when I type on a typewriter a different part of my brain kicks into gear.  Suddenly words start forming on the page directly from my heart, with nothing but my fingers and the clacking keys on the paper as a mediator between my thoughts and the letter I am crafting.  I love typewriters.  So does my two year old (who will soon be three!)  This summer he asked if he could please write a letter, probably to Papa Hat or Granny-in-Agassiz, though I don't recall now who it was for.  I said he could but only if he was VERY careful, which he usually was.  This time he wasn't though... what posessed him I will never know but he carefully ripped out every last inch of my black and red ribbon and in the process the good old typewriter got out of alignment.  I was shocked and sad and didn't know what to do!  So I looked online (ironically) to find a typewriter repairman.

Thanks to my sons experimenting with ink and ribbon I was privileged to meet Mr. Polson and hear the history of my thrift-store-find typewriter.  I will save the story for another blog post because I am so tired.  If this was writen on a typewriter you would start to notice more and more mistakes as I became more and more sleepy... I will leave you with the quote from a little boy I met at the Regional Assembly of Text one day while making buttons.  I thought it was so ironic that this little boy who has only ever known computers was amazed at the speed of this new technology, the typewriter. 

"Mom LOOK!  This is so cool!  I am typing the letters here on the keyboard, and the letters are going STRAIGHT onto the page!!!  You don't even need a printer!  It's INSTANT!" 

Letter 27 - Kissing Robots

Letter #11: Follow the way of peace

Christina, I would love to write you a letter back right now and run off to a mailbox and send it off to Toronto... but I know now that it would take approximately 10.5 days to get there (not including weekends) and by the time it gets there it will be, well, old??  Hmm... maybe this is the point of sharing letters for a month.  To realize that feelings and thoughts are still valid even if there is space and time between them being shared.  Even if by the time you get my letter and read it I feel completley different.  I too have been feeling anxious about life and wish we could sit face to face (not on facebook) and drink a non-virtual coffee and talk about how to balance it all and maybe, more importantly, how not to balance it all.  Thank you for the reminder to follow the way of peace - an encouragement in the midst of a hectic time!

You like to share, right? RIGHT??

Hello Web 2.0!

Letter #9: Monday's Mail!

Letters #5 & 8: Gracing my Fridge Today

On Wednesday the CanadaPost delivery guy stuck #5 through our mail slot.  Yesterday it was #6 and I had great plans to post them both last night but instead stayed up until midnight marking Science 9 tests on reproduction.  Since it started snowing I don't even have to open my door to get the mail, it just lands haphazardly in a pile on the ground.  This isn't always a good thing as it can be mistaken for a pile of junkmail quite easily... mostly because I usually have piles of junkmail right there by the mail slot.  What a coincidence.

I laughed at these terrible stories, only because they are such great windows into the life of a mom with a young toddler and a baby!  I remember these days all too well and it is always amazing to me what a change there can be from a just two year old to an almost three year old.  Seriously.  How did I survive having a newborn and a 22 month old??  How did I not lock them BOTH out of the house?

Today #9, and #10 arrived but I have not even opened their lovely envelopes.  I think I'll wait until both boys are sleeping and I can actually take a moment to enjoy the ink on the paper.  Until tomorrow, happy reading!

Letters #6 & 7: Google-Stalking