Sweet New Bag

Huge new bag for my friend Sheila. I posted a pattern I wanted to buy on Facebook and Sheila asked extra nice. We designed it together and she plans to use it for knitting projects. Because I like her I used extra fabric to make a knitting needle roll up and a key fob. I tucked those inside the bag before I sent it off.

She reports that she loves her bag and will take it with her the Rhinebeck for the wool festival. Wish I were going, too. Now I'm working on one for Sheila's daughter. I wonder what freebie goodies I'll put in hers? Maybe a wet diaper/clothes bag for her sweet little one.

Thoughts?

Make New Friends and Keep the Old?

photo credit: Simon Howden

Remember that song? My kids learned it in kindergarten. The song asks us to make new friends and keep the old, one is silver and the other gold. What if the old friends are also the new friends?

I found myself asking this question all day Tuesday and into Wednesday. My family loaded up the car and hurtled from Tulsa toward Pittsburgh, PA (City of Champions). Since this trip is over 1000 miles, we stop on the way to presevere parental sanity and some semblance of routine; usually we stay at a hotel with a pool. But this year, after reconnecting on Facebook with a long lost friend whose home was almost a midway point, we planned to stay with her.

My emotions jiggled inside me; I was nervous, excited, anxious, giggly, happy and curious. I met Kristin when I was 19 years old, almost 20 years ago. We had an intense friendship over several years of college and wrote and spoke regularly. Then we graduated, married, had babies and lost touch. I wondered during our drive to her house what seeing her again would be like.

I knew the big chunks: kids, marriage, struggles, the usual. But did she still love music? What was her husband like? How about her kids? Would we have anything to talk about? Would my husband feel totally out of place?

Turns out, Kristin, like me, is different than she was all those years ago. And strikingly the same. Thoughtful, intelligent, deliberate and kind. I honestly can't remember what drew me to her in the first place, but I do know what draws me to her now. So I find myself with a brand new old friendship. One that I hope will grow.

Just Say No

I have never been a bumper sticker kind of girl. There is something so personal about slapping a slogan on your car for the whole world to see. It always seems vulnerable and in-your-face for me.

I feel the same way about t-shirts and other apparel. I won't even consider shirts with store names or silly sayings; I do not permit my children to shill for mass producers either, by splashing their little bodies with someone else's name. I just don't like it.

Facebook status updates lately have been like a huge traffic jam I'm stuck in, all the cars idling in a sea of personal opinion and assumption. And I will not be silent another minute.

My "friends" invite me to join their various groups assuming my participation. Other acquaintances decry their political affiliation in an attitude that presupposes my agreement. People complain about the current president and his cabinet, others reference past presidents and their apparent greatness or lack thereof.

I'm not a total scrooge. Some slogans make me laugh, or think or evoke some emotional response. Some of them are even empirically true. But there are two things I dislike about them. The first is that a life reduced to platitudes is not one I want to live. I'd rather not be tacked down by one stupid quote shouted from the rooftops of my status update.

But the second is more insidious and divisive. The animosity people display toward current or former administrations does little to change anything positive. When one can not move beyond her hatred for leaders she is ignoring the point of our democratic system. Whining about it doesn't change anything. Hateful rhetoric, again, has no positive point or result. Our country is more divided than ever and these rallying cry ideologies not only get in the way of a system that is beautifully, if not perfectly, formed, but they hearken to days where dissent was not tolerated, where differences in opinion could get you killed.

I'm sure I sound a little Pollyanna here, and most people would not choose "patriot" as their first word to describe me. Perhaps the real reason I hate these slogans is the arrogance behind them. The arrogant stance that one's position, idea, or belief is supreme. The puffed up assumption that if I know you then I of course agree with you.

All they really make me want to do is roll my eyes or dig in for a debate. Until now, I've either bitten my virtual tongue or been rendered utterly speechless. I need a strategy for replying that will be kind but stop the madness. Any ideas?

The Artifice of Intimacy

Social networking seemed at first to me like its target audience would be the tweens and teens who clatter away, communicating with their flying text fingers instead of their mouths. But since my husband is a teacher, we wanted to see what the younguns were up to on the old internets. We each got Facebook accounts, and we have officially joined the swirling, hyping horde.

And I love it.

I love that my kids' classmates moms are on there and I know what they do when they're not being "moms." I love seeing what former classmates are up to, who's married and who had kids and who moved. It is like a huge online reunion.

Which is also what makes me squirm.

When I accept a friend request, suddenly, someone I haven't seen in ages knows exactly what I'm doing, what I'm thinking and where I'm going. My friend can't imagine anyone would care that she is now shopping for doggie diapers or listening to piano practice. Writing my status updates, on the other hand, are the highlight of my day.

That is until I realize who has access to it. The cute boys I crushed on, the popular girls who loathed me (or vice verse), the friend who fell through the cracks, the drifter no one really knew.

It seems strange to me that items intended for people who know me now are being passed along to people who knew me then. And yes, they are two different people. Same name, different ideas. The mommies I talk to in pickup line want the deets on the new yarn store I checked out. And so do the friends from science class who didn't know I know how to knit.

Does having someone in your friends profile mean they know who you are?