Sometimes we meet people of similar nature or character, like a twin, which make us realize we are not alone in our particular set of circumstances. It can be a stranger who shares a story, a family member that confides a secret, or a story we read about where someone is going through our same experience. It can come in an email, or a phone call - often when we least expect. Their twin experience comforts us, and we relax our scolding hold on our own conscience.
There is an emotion that coincides with the connection to the vulnerability of another person's truth, which matches our own. It hits us in our hearts and we are forever connected. It is as if somewhere in our soul we recognize a 'kindred spirit'. There is a sense of relief that overtakes us. It feels like home.
I was cautioned when starting this blog, that it can have far-reaching implications. There are those bloggers who have been fired for their posts, and sued for content. There is a risk of opening up a part of ones life for the "raw" public. There are future employers scouting the Internet for web pages by interviewees. Bloggers run the risk of not being hired by conservative employers.
But all I know is many years ago when I was 18, I had an English teacher in college who required her English students to keep journals, which we turned into her every Friday. My father died at the end of August that summer. I entered her class fresh with a broken, aching heart. I was an avid writer growing up, keeping a trunk full of stories, poems and diaries. I wrote about everything and everyone, but I never wrote about my father's cancer. I ignored it, as if by not acknowledging what was happening, it would go away and everything would return to what it once was.
My first entries in this college English journal were awkward. I was still in shock and numb from the experience of watching a man I treasured die a slow and agonizing death over five years. The teacher kept telling me to write ANYTHING even if it was just the word, "blah". So I began to write, "Dear Journal. Love Catherine". The English teacher would comment under my seven entries of "Dear Journal, Love Catherine". She would write clever comments in red like, "Good week!" "Tough decision!". They would make me laugh and slowly I began to write my thoughts for her to read.
I don't know when it exactly happened, but one day I found myself angry at the bizarre nature of funerals and death in America. I poured out my heart describing the ritual of picking out my father's coffin. I saw the irony and the humor. The following Monday when she returned my journal, she wrote, "I have never read anything that touched me like this story. I sobbed through the whole journal entry. You have a gift, please share it." And that was it. Words began to gush, revealing my anger, bitterness, sadness and loneliness onto the lined pages of my English journal.
Then my mother and I had a fight. The kind of fight two heart broken females have when one is a teenager and the other is the parent. I moved out in one day. I packed everything into my car and just drove off. I burned the journal and stopped writing.
I stopped writing for 18 years.
Fast forward to 1997 (yes my mother and I long ago made up and she forgave my brattiness) when a funny thing happened at work. I was given a laptop computer and access to the Internet. I was to test software and how a loan officer might use the Internet. Once home, like a chocolate addict given the keys to Sees, I used my computer as a magic carpet and flew all over the world exploring events and cultures I only imagined. (Who cares what a loan officer uses it for...!). One night, while quietly reading about Ireland and Gaelic language, my very first Instant message popped up on the computer screen. It made this great little sound ... like a bird whistling. I almost dropped the laptop, as it startled me so.
Suddenly there I was, from my lap in our little cottage home ... writing. I love the back and forth banter between two people in an instant message. Truly this is a writer's paradise. We are most at home when typing a conversation, rather than delivering it in person. The ability to write to new found friends over the Internet gave me the strength to leave an unhappy marriage. I became fascinated with the written word and adored my new by-coastal friendships.
Meanwhile, I was dealing with corporate America, with all the acquisitions and mergers watching job after job disappear to the East Coast, the Southwest and then to India. Throughout this, my online friends encouraged me. Each new company gave me a new laptop and my Internet skills grew along with the number of online acquaintances. My magic carpet was now a turbo jet.
I became sick with Hashimoto's somewhere around 2002 and went through a particularly rough period in my life. One day, while lying in bed I came across the opportunity to begin this blog. I had so many thoughts running through my head which were screaming at me to be written down. Without even thinking, I naturally followed the steps to create a blog and dove head first into writing. I was back. It was very difficult at first, like stretching a new muscle. But over time it evolved into the flow of a person's life story. Maybe not everything, but an idea of what my life is like.
Then the emails began. People writing to me about their thyroid problems, opening up and sharing very private, painful experiences. Experiences I can all too well relate. Suddenly I am surrounded by kindred spirits.
The most recent surprise is from an old friend who helped me through my divorce. A wonderful, kind man who now lives on the East Coast. In his email he confides his own personal thyroid hell. He has suffered in silence these many years we have known each other. How interesting that we end up with the same health issue. Through reading my blog it allows him the opportunity to share his story - one very much like my own.
I am pretty much ok with my own story until I read it through someone else's words. When I read their suffering, my heart aches because I know exactly how they feel. It is a painful truth how many doctors out there allow thyroid patients to suffer chronically without lifting a finger to help them. And now I can share my experience with him and help him find a way to feel good again. Such a tall, handsome man should feel better and be able to enjoy his fascinating life to its fullest ... my kindred spirit.
How can it be said that blogging is unwise? To open up part of ones life to the world in the hopes it helps another find peace within their own is a selfless gift. It is a gift that we writers share with the world. It is who we are. How else can we bring the world together in a common bond? I remember when online dating and meeting others online was thought to be insane by the general public. Look at it now ... it seems odd when people don't meet via the computer.
I can't worry about corporate America anymore. I haven't found it to be a place that has the employees best interests at heart. If the company stocks go down, you could be the best thing since the computer chip, but you will still find your butt in an unemployment line. It no longer matters how much education you possess ... it is all about the price of the stock. You are just a dollar number of some accountants excell spreadsheet... and you cost too much.
But blogging and writing... I do know there are writers out there telling their stories and changing people's lives. No amount of stock climbs and crashes will change what we write. I'd rather fall on the side of writers and search for more kindred spirits. And leave corporate America to chew up and spit out someone else.
Until next time-
C
