Tag Archives: community

Around the global campfire

When I think about sitting around a campfire, I think of camping in the summer with family and friends. No matter the plans for the day, the evening brings everyone together, adults and kids, sitting around a crackling fire, with marshmallows, s’mores, and poking sticks stirring the flames. The fire is a communal event, with laughter and storytelling weaved into light conversations, in a common shared experience.

I came across this quote recently:

Technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories. –Laurie Anderson

Think about how technology has changed our storytelling! Books and movies have captivated our imaginations, and the internet allows us all to share our ideas around a global campfire. We have this amazing ability to communicate with each other now, and how is it being used?

Since we are truly at a stage where we can sit around a global campfire, what stories are we choosing to tell?

Breakfast with a friend

“Come gather around people, wherever you roam
And admit that the waters around you have grown
And accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’ ~ Bob Dylan

We sat at a booth chatting, breakfast done, bill paid. We had already turned down more coffee and the waitress was kind enough to fill our water glasses. The restaurant wasn’t full, we weren’t filling a potentially needed booth, and so the waitress didn’t mind that we were still there over 30 minutes after our meal was done.

We were reminiscing about our childhood, and how people would come for a visit and stay for dinner. In my family there were 4 kids so we made a family of 6, but my mother never cooked for less than 10. Someone’s friend (or 2), an aunt, granny, a cousin, even a neighbour might be joining us. If it was just the 6 of us, we had leftovers.

This doesn’t happen much anymore. Having friends over means a half-day of getting the house ready, and a half day of preparing food. Meeting for coffee? How’s next week Thursday? Breakfast? Pick one of these two Sundays. Dinner with a group of friends? We better use that appointment App to find a day that works for all of us.

Or maybe we just chat on the phone. Maybe we text. Comment on Facebook. Like a friend’s tweet… smiley face emoji:)

Gatherings used to be impromptu, spontaneous, and they extended past expected times. “See you soon,” not “See you later,” as in weeks or months later.

Things have changed.

I’m going to try to bring the old ways back a bit. I’m tracking my social connections this year. A dinner and a breakfast last week, a morning coffee and a minor league hockey game this weekend… A walk with my wife, dinner out with my daughter… I’m going to see if intentionally keeping track will inspire me to connect face-to-face more frequently with the people that are geographically available. That doesn’t diminish the opportunities to connect with people who I can’t always see. For those, we have spaces like this.

Staying ‘on brand’ while being digitally present

A few months ago, I shared a link on Twitter to an article about James Fridman’s Twitter Account. People send James photos to Photoshop and he changes the photos in entertaining ways. Like this:

And like this:

But the ‘Featured Image’ on the post I shared was of a girl in a bathing suit who James had done one of these photoshop requests for. I shared it and then I got a Direct Message from someone in my community that I respect, who said she was surprised that I would share something like this. In all honesty, I didn’t think much of it, so I looked at the tweet again and thought two things. First, that it wasn’t a big deal that I shared a photo of someone in a bathing suit because this was about photoshop humour. Then I thought, ‘Would I share this photo on its own if it wasn’t for the article going with it?’… and I realized I wouldn’t. So, I deleted the tweet and shared one specific tweet that highlighted James’ humour, like the two tweets above.

Yesterday, I got a phone call from my sister about one of my Daily Ink blog posts. She said to me that while she understood the point I was trying to make, I came off as a bit full of myself in an unflattering way. She was right. That wasn’t my intent, but I could totally see how it could be interpreted that way. I went back to the post and made some minor changes, which I think changed the tone of the post to one that was more about my intention as opposed to mistaken interpretation.

I share a lot online. If you were to look at 100 of my blog posts, here on Daily Ink, or on my Pair-a-Dimes educational blog, or if your chose to read 100 of my tweets, I think you could learn a lot about me. I think you could get a good sense for my character, what I stand for, and what kind of a person I am. However, if you chose to judge me on my worst blog post or my worst Tweet, well then I’m sure I wouldn’t look so good. I recognize that, and I’m happy to take a look at my worst blog posts and tweets, and change or delete them. That said, I know more will come later. If I’m going to share as much as I do, I’m going to occasionally share something ‘off brand’, something that doesn’t generally fit with my identity or at least my digital identity.

I touched on this a bit in my post, Ideas on a Spectrum, where I noted that there seems to be a culture of attacking a person based on not liking their opinion or a statement they share online. I on the other hand am fortunate to have people around me that are respectful and thoughtful. The person who sent me a Direct Message about my tweet could have said something in a reply, in a public setting, to me but instead chose to send me a private message. My sister could have thought, ‘Well, that’s not like Dave’ and then let it pass by, but she gave me a call and said, “I know this isn’t what you intended, but you should know that this is how I read it.”

Public comments can help too. I really appreciated Stephen Downes helping me identify the context of a meme that I shared as my photo to go with a post. See Once upon a meme where I discussed this. Stephen said in a comment that he wouldn’t be comfortable using the meme and named the meme so that it would be easy for me to find information about it. He gave me what I needed to be informed in a pubic, but very respectable way.

These are people I want in my lives. People who know me, or I guess you could also say, ‘know my brand’, and who help me stay on course. I’ll make mistakes, and because I share a lot digitally, I’ll be making those mistakes in public. I appreciate having a community that recognize that mistakes are mistakes, and who are willing to help me.

A little reminder to educators

I’m writing this as a reminder to myself as well as to others. This isn’t something I’m preaching, it’s something important enough to keep at the forefront of my mind, our minds, as the new school year is about to begin.

There is always so much to do at the start of the school year, and there is the curriculum that must get started… but above all, there are human beings that are coming into our buildings that we need to get to know.

Human beings who have had wonderful summers. Human beings that lost a loved one. Human beings that arrive to school hungry. Human beings that help take care of their younger siblings. Human beings that love their pets, video games, riding their bikes, fashion, art, history, and science.

Get to know these amazing humans. Start there. Not just with the ones that make this easy, with them all. Take the time, your students deserve it.

T.I.C. – “This is China” – Community

2011-02-28_07

There is a Chinese school right behind ours, and their main entrance to our shared field and school is at the side of our building. It snowed last night and when I walked by their entrance there were about 15 parents and a few older students shoveling the front walk.

Many hands make light work:-)

I’m sure there are a few small communities around the world where this could happen, but living in a city of 6 million and seeing this community effort makes my morning!

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*Update: There is more to this story… See the rest on my Pairadimes blog.