Many years ago, at an early 90s Thanksgiving dinner, my cousin Jeff told me he had recently talked to his sister, Susy, who lived in Barrow, Alaska, for over an hour. I responded that I would be interested in knowing what the price tag on that call would be and he told me they had chatted via AOL. "AOL?" I asked. And the next day, I installed it on my computer and a new world began.
AOL introduced me to many people all over the United States and as I hung out in the Thirtysomething and Portland chat rooms, I met people who eventually became real, true friends from all over the US, many of whom remain in my life today. In fact, and few people really know this, the first time I met my husband was when this guy named Dave41236 (or something - we just called him DaveAndABunchOfNumbers) popped into the Portland chat room because he was moving to Portland and wanted our opinion on where he should live and what was going on. Several months later, LeAnn (Waverunner) introduced Dave and me at a party and within a couple of months, we were dating - the rest is history. Dave and I stopped hanging out in Chat Rooms after we got married and shortly thereafter, we changed our email from AOL and barely gave it another thought.
Until Facebook entered our lives. Here was a wonderful avenue for reconnecting with friends and staying in touch with family. "Finding" childhood buddies and college classmates is the main part but just recently I've learned the true value of this social media outlet.
Our friends have recently adopted a little family of four siblings (aged 13 boy, 3-year old twin boys and 8 month-old girl) and because their youngest-of-three bio kids is 10, they no longer had essentials for little kids. On a lark, I posted to my Facebook page a request that if anyone had outgrown clothes or items they were no longer using and which might be in Goodwill bags, might they consider rerouting them to this little family whose hearts were overflowing but who needed some essentials for the additions to their family. I could not have anticipated what happened next:
Within two days, my friend who lives in Qatar had sent to my friend's email box gift certificates to two retail locations. I had sent to my mail box for them a $100 gift card from a childhood friend. I had delivered to my house a crib with all linens and necessities, safety gates, closthes and toys; I had promises of donations and help from far and wide, and none of these amazing people knew my friends. Then a friend posted my request to HER Facebook page and earlier this week, I met the daughter of her friend who had put out the word in her office and the back of my Escape was filled with what she and her co-workers had gathered, including another gift card. So the daughter of a friend of a friend of a friend has touched this little family and all because of this social media outlet.
Oh, there are so many more examples I could cite. Sure, there are the not-so-positive political and religious arguments that one can chose to ignore - but for the most part, young Mark did the world a favor when he hacked into that mainframe and I'm thankful for the reconnections and the hearts I've come to know. Real, true friendships.
We've come a long way from "you've got mail."
Well said, as always, My friend.
ReplyDelete♡ya
Very cool, your the greatest!
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