Communicating

Jo was a friend of Jeannie’s of many years. Now retired from teaching, Jo has continued a monthly newsletter she’s sent to friends and family for many years.

Her newsletters are the snail mail equivalent of blogs, like this one, though Jo’s topics are exclusively personal, trips, and daily life with cats Gypsy and Lola, her annual trip to visit family and friends, and her photography and crafts, which she combines into some of the most beautiful and unique note and greeting cards you’ll ever see. I look forward to the envelopes containing her musings.

A new blog, short term and topical – by my daughter Heather – started me thinking about communicating. Heather has returned to academia – law school – a decade after graduating from the University of Minnesota. This summer, she’s taking intellectual property law in Munich, Germany, under the auspices of the George Washington University College of Law. To keep her friends and family informed she’s launched “Ein Deutscher Student.” a blog specifically about her trip. Well, I caught up with her entries yesterday, and they’re nothing short of delightful.

This whole personal blog thing was started by Courtney, Heather’s (a bit) younger sister. Courtney has recently joined the history department faculty at the United States Military Academy at West Point; she started a blog while in graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In point of fact it largely dwelt on her trips to Okinawa to spend time with husband Dave, who was commanding a Patriot missile battery there.

They are now in New York, and I was able to spend time with them while covering the Lime Rock Park. As you can imagine, they’ve been busy moving and getting settled in a new place with new responsibilities (I’ll devote one of these entries to detail as soon as I can.) In the meantime, however, I can’t direct you to their blog, because it’s disappeared – honest!

Son Ashley has no blog, doesn’t answer phone calls, and rarely responds to emails. Is that just a condition of being a twenty-something single male? I know he can write. In fact, I think that’s what he’s doing for a living – here is a music album review – perhaps he has to be paid to write anything at all?

My sister Barb does a blog about the adventures of the Millers, as she and husband Jim ski, ride, and drive through life.

All of which brings me to this tome. I’ve not been as diligent about it since Jeannie died. There’s less to tell, of course. Even commentary about the world around doesn’t seem as important, and isn’t focused any longer by our discourse.

I write for two other web sites, wrote/edited a race series yearbook last year, and am working on this year’s follow-up; that means about 500 words a day. Still, I do need to get to Peninsula Pen more often. I’ll try.

In the meantime, enjoy Ein Deutscher Student.