The morning drive is all about the music. Loud & lovely. {Oh just go buy the album already, it is fantastic, every last song. Repeatedly. They are poets.} Singing, at the top of our lungs. The kids exit at the school, I continue on singing solo all the way to work.
I can bake now. Did I tell you? I'm most impressed. The kids think I'm a star. (Shhh, let's allow that for awhile, shall we? They're still young after all.) Okay now for something random yet important methinks.
While reading an article tonight I gasped aloud, and a tear sprang to my eyes. I sense a very divine connection here in the world of the interwebs, but reading this particular story drilled it home for me. An expectant woman befriended another on one of those mommy websites, it then became their meeting place to chat and swap stories of expectations, hopes & dreams. They carried on throughout their pregnancies, births & subsequent child rearing together online, all the while exchanging correspondence, advice and friendship.
One day while looking at a photograph of the other's child, the woman noticed a distinctively different colour of the child's pupil. It was white in the photograph, and due to a previous encounter with such a thing, she emailed her online friend immeditately to suggest a doctor's visit. Her intention wasn't to alarm the woman or cause trouble, just to help.
It turned out that the child had retinoblastoma. The email likely saved the child's life. She has a prosthetic eye now, and is cancer free after having multiple chemo & radiation treatments.
Why bother telling you this? Because I used to view the internet as superficial. Social media to me was a waste of time. Networking and building connections with strangers seemed odd to me. But in the last year I've really come to value the friendships I've made online. Each connection a link to my world. Online life is valuable too. I hear all the time that people want to limit their online time, to get a "real life" etc. But to them I say everything in moderation.
There is a reason far beyond what you can see right now for you reading this at this very moment. And another for you having connected with me at all, be it online or in "real life". In some cases, with some of you, I've had the pleasure of both. I've never been disappointed to meet any of you. Not one, single, solitary regret.
I've flown to Vancouver, Arizona, New York & Florida just to meet with other bloggers. (I've driven to Toronto and had lunch with a blogger. I have met with the most delightful and charming blogger for lunch and shopping in Niagara on the Lake and we plan to do it again in the spring.)
Each experience different from the next and with each I've had a kind of enlightenment. Each person has lit up my life to some degree. So the next time you make an online connection, don't dismiss it as superficial. You get what you put out. Remember that simple rule: you attract back in what you have put out into the world. {Plant your hopes with good seeds.}
If you like to sing loud in cars, take photographs, bake, and travel out into the world to meet beautiful "strangers" then perhaps that is what you will get back too. {And you just may even save someone's life.}
xoxo
Beautiful! I agree completely.....I love my bloggy friends....I have met so many kindred spirits....people I would have never met in "real life". I found you from Gypsy Girls Guide.....and I am loving reading through your blog and getting to know you.
Posted by: Celia | January 12, 2011 at 12:10 PM
yes ... i value so many of my online friendships and love how they have moved into the real exhange of phone conversations, letters and meetings. some of my most heart and soul filled friendships happened first on the internet. xo
Posted by: darlene | January 12, 2011 at 12:31 PM
Love it. Hey! You never came and visited me!!!
Posted by: Samosas For One | January 13, 2011 at 02:22 PM
Yeah!!! I agree with you. I think blogging friendships are similar to old fashioned penpal friendships. Some of those connections may fade away but others will last a lifetime. I'm hoping that they will!
Posted by: susanna | January 21, 2011 at 09:14 PM
Last a lifetime, that is.
Posted by: susanna | January 21, 2011 at 09:15 PM