The Kindness of Strangers

I don’t know how people in the “olden days” did it. How did they lead such a solitary life? How did they not interact all the time with everyone and talk about everything? I think it is one of the great blessings of our generation to be able to be contacted at any moment and be available when we want to be available. I love my blackberry. I love getting my email when it arrives. I love that my friends can reach me. I love being able to answer questions right when they arrive, not waiting until I log on to a computer or can reach a phone. I love texting. Last month I sent and received 1800 texts. That is a LOT of texting. But I was involved with everyone and people know they could find me.

I have a friend who is fighting in Iraq right now. She sent me a great letter and one thing she said is that God will send me angels to help with this time. She is very correct. The internet is another way to stay involved with everyone. I have found a new side of it with my family’s new challenge. Suddenly the world has opened up and I am meeting people every day who are going through what I am, who are going through what my dad is, who have already gone through it and are available to tell their tales. I signed up for a forum on a site that I love, lungevity.org. It is awesome and the forums are really open and abundant. I posted an “I’m New Here” post on Friday. By Monday I had already received 5 responses to my post. Three of them were people who were in the same boat and were there to talk about it. I felt a rush of compassion for these strangers. People who soon will not be strangers at all.

I love that my father can get a hold of me at any time. I love that my sister can text me from work and vent without having to interrupt anything. I love that my friends can email me requests and I can answer them immediately. I love that I can do work from the road and I love that I am always available.

So say what you want about being too available and our lives not being our own. There is nothing more important to me than my family and the fact that they can get a hold of me any time they want, well, I would trade that for….well almost anything.