Happy Birthday Grandma

On April 17 1891, my grandmother, Ivy Schmidt was born. She would have been 116 tomorrow. She died three months short of her 100th birthday in January 1991, a Bradmanesque age of 99.something (a little less than the famous 99.94)

On this site, we focus somewhat on generational differences. We are about living in the age of boomers, Gen-X, Gen-Y. Is there anyone born in the 19 century who:

1. is still living?
2. has access to the Internet?
3. is blogging?

Is there anyone giving an internet voice to a living centenarian? For some, and maybe for many, if it doesn't have a an online identity, it's not real. Or at least, it's not considered. How I hope that thoughts and opinions of those generations of our recent past, even if they have no marketing-speke moniker, are being caught. Otherwise we only have, well, insecure memory.

GrandMa died about the time that the Internet was being conceived... However in her time...

GrandMa produced four children who all grew up and had families... seventeen grandchildren (including several baby boomers) who produced dozens and dozens of Gen-Xers and Gen Ys and... well...

Happy birthday GrandMa! It should be a holiday. How things have changed.

Hello and Farewell

On Christmas day, just after 5.00pm, my wife gave birth to our daughter, a precious gift.

Through the power of the internet, and the assistance of my nephew in Adelaide, my mum was able to see up to date pictures of our baby girl and rejoice.

Yesterday, December 30 around 10.30am , after a relatively short illness, my mum died, peacefully, comfortably and with the solid conviction of the promise of eternal life.

Hello and welcome Kaelyn. Farewell Mother.

Note to Self: Stop Thinking About It

Note to self:

You are preparing for a baby to arrive into your life and into your world. Get used to the fact that it is a world that is almost beyond recognition of the babies born twenty years ago!

We are shopping for baby gear online and bidding for some items on eBay. We know everything there is to know about how this baby is developing. We get and receive daily reports via email and Internet. We have access to a knowledge base that is beyond what we could have conceived twenty years ago (pardon the pun).

We will be "mature parents" though not necessarily the oldest in our pre-natal class. We will be savvy parents - savvy about the technology, the attitudes and the new world - and savvier than many.

Action:

Just go with it. Act as if it's been like this all your life. It's the only sensible thing for Boomer-Gen-X expectant couple can do... and stop thinking about how much everything has changed in twenty years. Celebrate the moment. Hang on and enjoy the ride. Thank God for the opportunity to live the adventure (previous post)

Blog your way to recovery

Imagine the scenario. You have survived a serious car accident. You are in hospital for an extended stay – surgeries, physio, medication and extensive healing required.

Amidst your pain and treatment, your hospital carer sets you up with a patient blog site.

If it was me in the body brace and bandages, I suspect the last thing I would be thinking about is sharing my thoughts on a blog.

Well this is the reality for a dear friend, Michelle in a hospital in Fargo North Dakota, USA

Clever people these hospital carers. One way or another, Michelle gets her “story” out and so begins the Internet element of her healing.

A not-for-profit organisation called CaringBridge, inspired by personal tragedy, has made it possible for 38,000 hospital patients to receive five million guest book messages and 235 million virtual visits. Who knows how significant millions of expressions of love and support for people at one of their lowest points of their life could be?

Instant virtual community of friends and family are connected via her site, and all are able to keep up-to-date and in some way participate in her recovery.

My friend Michelle has received hundreds of messages. She has a long way to go in her recovery, and her CaringBridge site will be part of it via her individual journal, guestbook, photos, tributes and links.

ANZACS and Living in a TRADITIONAL Internet Age

We just celebrated – if that’s the right word – ANZAC Day in Australia (April 25), a day that is not only the most universally acknowledged national holiday in Australia (quite a few people have issues with “Australia day”), but one that continues to attract cross generational appeal.

The story of incredible loss and sacrifice combined with courage and a barely understood quality called Aussie mateship gave rise to the ANZAC spirit. It took another world war and more than twenty years before a fledgling tradition was claimed.

Those who were there at the time remember. Those who grew up with the aforementioned and heard the stories honour them. Those who are not connected by family links to ANZACS have learned to respect what it all means. And now, two or three generations on, ANZAC Day is a time-honoured tradition.

As my first post, and with respect, hopefully not my last post, I have been wondering what it takes to establish a time-honoured tradition. For many, the concept of Internet time has changed the reference points for time. We have come to expect information, goods and services, relationships, transactions, education, negotiations, consultations, aggregations and almost every other *ation to be available instantly. The concept of delayed gratification is academic or even quaint.

This is not a rant about Internet time, just a slowly cooked opinion that time and tradition are NOT relative terms, nor can either be hurried up. We live in an age that readily dismisses traditions or traditional approaches, yet one that desperately wants to establish them. I’ve heard the qualifier “traditionally” applied to sporting teams with barely a decade of history, to TV talent shows after three consecutive seasons (can anyone name our first three Australian Idols), and even to computer operating systems (ahh Windows 3.x).

Will any of our stories of today become true traditions? What will the benchmark for “time-honoured” be? My guess is that we will find tenuous links being made to or claimed as traditions. On a global scale, traditions can be established as quickly as a major act of terrorism or some natural catastrophe occurs.

But tradition is not a currency easily acquired. While the Internet, and especially Web 2.x offers us who are blessed to live in a free and technology accessible nation the chance to share it, learn it and even influence it a little, I just wonder what traditions we will leave behind us.

Perhaps in a generation or two, people will be reading these blogs in the same way we flick through our grandparents’ letters or diaries from a bygone time.

For any traditionalist who happens to land on this blog, hang in there, grab on to your seat, enjoy the ride, and know that YOUR knowledge of time-honoured tradition can not be overtaken. Who knows, it might be up to you to pass on the tradition.

Let’s hope it’s not only by blog or email.