Category Archives: Uncategorised

Picture by Gamerforever.

Many of the comment sections in the blogs I follow are slowly growing quieter.

The content hasn’t changed as far as I can tell, but for some reason people are responding to new posts less often. The funny thing is that, at least for me, the number of visitors who come to this site has increased since I started blogging in 2010. Last month alone I saw a 30% bump in visits.

Is it due to readers posting links to stuff they like on social media instead? I’ve definitely been doing that more and more often over the last couple of years. There definitely is something to be said for telling all 5 (or 50, or 5000) of your followers that you loved a certain link.

Yet I think we’re losing a valuable part of blogging culture.

We’re all wrong sometimes. One of the strengths of reading and writing a public blog is that you rub shoulders with people from all walks of life. Yes, there are occasional trolls, but most of the folks I’ve met online have stretched my mind in good ways. The fact that we see things from different perspectives is a strength, not a weakness. There have been times when the comment section of a particular post is ten times more interesting than what originally sparked the conversation.

Which is why this silence frightens me. I don’t want to live in an echo chamber.

Which is why I’ve decided to comment more often on other people’s posts. For every two links I share, my goal is to leave one comment on sites that don’t require you to sign up on them first. (The annoyance of that is an entirely different post 😉 ).

I hope you will join me.

Maybe we can turn the tide.

Here is this week’s list of blog posts and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

A Day in the Life of a Street Kid via Christina_Z13. I blinked away tears as I read this. Be sure to check out part one as well.

How a Convicted Murderer Prepares for a Job Interview. A really interesting piece about a group of ex-cons who are trying to make new lives for themselves.

How to Talk to Anyone (For at Least a Few Minutes). A very helpful post. The rest of the site may be NSFW.

Why We Tweet via alfageeek. I’d argue that this is true about everything we post online.

Inspiration P*rn or Unfit Parent. The title of this piece has been edited to prevent search bots from sending me visitors who are looking for things this blog doesn’t provide. 😉 What I liked the most about this post was how much it reminds me of my own childhood. My parents were always the ones who picked up trash around the neighbourhood to keep it tidy. I haven’t heard of many other families who make this one of their traditions, but it’s a good one!

From Pennies Saved via DJ_Whisenant:

I’ve been

savin’ on up; I’ve been

savin’ on up for a

fit and fine holi-

day…

World War II always seemed like it took up a disproportionate amount of time in my high school history classes. Because of that I’ve purposefully avoided books about that era as an adult. Until now.

Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields isn’t an easy read, but it’s an important one. I knew that German women who were free from mental and physical “defects” were pushed into having as many children as possible for their country. I didn’t know the extent of the political and social pressure on them, though, or how instrumental they were in the operation of prison camps and hospitals. Nursing was one of a handful of professions open to German women at the time, but many nurses found themselves ending lives instead of saving them.

This is a great choice if you’re in the mood to revisit World War II from the perspective of ordinary German women.

What have you been reading?

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, stories, photographs, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Since I Lost My Baby via fsouth. A gripping short story about grief, death, and coming to terms with a new chapter in life. Everything else I want to say about this piece includes spoilers, so my description of it remains vague. Just trust me when I tell you it’s a must-read!

How Having Multiple Boyfriends Is Like Having Multiple Kids. This post is innocuous, but other parts of the site are NSFW.

Tham Lod Cave. Who wants to explore this cave with me?

Evil Tyrants and Their Disappointing Family Members via pinkertonpark. It’s fascinating to see what members of the same family do and do not have  in common. Sharing the same DNA or home environment is no guarantee that you’ll share the same interests, religion, political beliefs, or anything else.

From What We Can & Can’t Trust via OriahMtnDrmr:

Inevitably, the person who has sought me out, says something like- “I don’t think I can ever trust my own judgement again- I didn’t see the lie, didn’t anticipate the betrayal, should have known, could have left, didn’t see who she was, what he was up to. . . .”

From Slavery’s Last Stronghold:

The usually stoic mother — whose jet-black eyes and cardboard hands carry decades of sadness — wept when she saw her child’s lifeless face, eyes open and covered in ants, resting in the orange sands of the Mauritanian desert. The master who raped Moulkheir to produce the child wanted to punish his slave. He told her she would work faster without the child on her back.

This week’s recommendation is The End of the Suburbs.

The most restless years of my childhood were spent in the suburbs. I hated relying on my parents to drive us into town to visit the library or catch a movie. What little there was to do within the geographic boundaries of our subdivision quickly became boring from overuse.

I was ecstatic when we moved to town the winter after I turned 15. At about 15,000 residents it was still achingly small for my tastes, but at least I could take a walk to rent movies, borrow library books, or buy a cookie at one of the old-fashioned bakeries in the original downtown strip. It was the faintest taste of the life in Toronto that awaited me as an adult.

This book explains how and why city life is once again becoming more popular than suburban life. We are reversing a trend that started decades ago, and I am as interested in why people flocked to the suburbs in the 1950s as I am in why they are now coming to their senses. 😛

Yes, I’m totally joking there. It’s just hard for me to see the appeal of suburban life. Rural addresses at least include ample space and a front row seat to the beauty of nature. The suburbs seem to include the worst of both worlds – you’re surrounded by people yet have little to no access to public transit, artistic festivals, or stores within walking distance.

What have you been reading?

Painting by Achraf Amiri.

Like most city people, I’ve perfected the art of not making eye contact with strangers. There have been times I’ve walked right by someone I knew without noticing them because I’m so focused on gliding through the crowd and preserving everyone’s illusion of personal space.

Yet I’ve been talking to a lot of strangers recently.

Most of them need directions. You can tell they’re about to approach you before they make the final decision to do so. The soft hesitation in their body language and furtive glances they toss at passer-byes gives them away.

Somehow they decide I’m the right person to approach.

Maybe I have a friendly face. I don’t know. It’s an easy way to help, though, and I don’t mind pointing them in the right direction if I know how to get to their destination.

But occasionally these interactions provide fodder for blog posts or short stories. The other day I was carrying home a case of soda when a stranger approached me.

“I don’t suppose I could have one of those?” he asked with a smile.

“Sorry, no,” I said. Good Canadians preface everything with an apology, and I’d been so wrapped up in my thoughts that it had taken me a few seconds to register what was happening. It’s a little odd to talk to people you don’t know up here in Toronto.

He shrugged and walked away, but I carried the conversation with me wishing I’d said yes. If nothing else, it would have given me more time to figure out why he was asking. The possibilities are endless.

(If the embedded video doesn’t work, click here).

What I love about this video is how creatively Catherine Bracy works to connect ideas that I would have never thought had anything in common.  It reminds me of Lifehacker, and I’m drawn to the idea that there are no “musts” in this lifetime.

As long as you’re not harming yourself or someone else against their will, you can opt into or out of anything. There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all life.

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, comics, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Hunting and Belonging via KSal1958. One of my very few complaints about living in a big city is how disconnected urban people are from the land. Hunting is unfashionable here and very few people garden (well, other than possibly growing a few herbs or a tomato plant if you’re lucky enough to have a windowsill/balcony). Our parks are either immaculately groomed or have strict rules about where people are allowed to roam if they’ve been kept “wild.” I totally understand why the culture is the way it is, but this essay makes me miss my more rural upbringing.

Remorse Pixie. This is so true.

10 Stories About Grandmother via Millie_Ho. It’s funny how much you can learn about someone through anecdotes.

Shipwrecked in Whole Foods. I don’t necessarily agree with everything I share on Suggestion Saturday, but I do think this author makes a good point about the weirdness of marketing sustainability, social responsibility, and genuinely healthy food to wealthy households. Everyone needs nutritious food to survive, and human civilization can only survive for a limited amount of time if we use up our resources faster than they can be replaced. Yet somehow these ideas have become trendy and luxurious. Paradoxically, I also feel like this author is being a little harsh on the environmental and health food movements. You can have a very healthy lifestyle on a tight budget with enough preparation and (informal) education.

The False Memory Archive: Did That Really Happen? via Zorabike. Such an interesting article.

From Hospice Is a Busy Place:

On a warm spring day, Maggie checked into hospice in a nearby town. At the age of 65, she had Stage Four ovarian cancer, and having refused chemotherapy and radiation treatments, her doctors recommended that she enter hospice as soon as possible.

From The Empathy Exams:

Empathy means realizing no trauma has discrete edges. Trauma bleeds. Out of wounds and across boundaries. Sadness becomes a seizure. Empathy demands another kind of porousness in response. My Stephanie script is twelve pages long. I think mainly about what it doesn’t say.

Generation Atheist is the most honest book I’ve read so far this year.

Deconversion can be a touchy topic. While some people are genuinely interested in my story, others approach the idea of a devout Christian gradually shedding her faith with horror. Rather than listening to what actually happened they take one’s words out of context and apply their own interpretation to what actually happened.

What I really appreciate about this collection is its diversity. There are contributors who are still reeling from the often unexpected social consequences of their reconversion to individuals who have long since made peace with their new realities. Preacher’s kids sit alongside ex-mormons, ex-muslims, and members of the LGBT community in an extremely interesting and provocative collections of essay.

If the contributors share one thing in common with one another it seems to be this: in most cases people who retained the love and support of their families – whether biological or chosen – have done significantly better emotionally than their peers who were shunned or disowned.

I know some of my readers are religious, and by no means do I want to dissuade them from their beliefs. But I do hope that by recommending this book I’ll give them a taste of what it’s like to stand in someone else’s shoes.

What have you been reading?