Posts by Jolisa
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Notes & Queries: In The Face of Global…, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Don't make me mention the war... !
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Mixed emotions, mostly negative ones: "O, the lack of humanity."
Which is the opposite of my initial response to the event itself: a cry of anguish, "The people!" That cry has never really stopped or changed (I have mostly managed to wall off the part of my brain that wants to return and return to the thought of what it was like to be one of the adults on those planes telling a child it would be all right.) and continues to be my response to any disaster, monumental or tiny in scale. The people.
So I wonder at the casual dehumanisation on display here. Only number 9 seems to engage with the event with any genuine humanity; the fact that the project traumatised its creator to the point where he was physically unable to work on it for a long while is pretty eloquent. And strangely reassuring.
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Hard News: Calling the race before it's over, in reply to Russell Brown,
Yup. Both basically stellar dudes who, once pointed in the same direction, could get so much done.
Plus, all things come to those who wait, right? In that nothing's guaranteed, and if you're in politics for the long haul, you can play the long game. Sometime's it's very good to be a good person-in-waiting.
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Hard News: Calling the race before it's over, in reply to Sacha,
I don’t have a dog in the fight and am struggling to make sense of this situation myself
Same. If only one of the Davids would change their name to Goliath, it would be so much easier to follow...
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Echoing Hebe above, and Emma a few pages back -- I find it impossible to quantify how wonderful it has been to "meet" so many fascinating minds here, and then to meet so many in person as well, with so many still to be met. It's also hard to express how much of a lifeline-to-home this place was for me while I was overseas. But I'll try. (I won't use names for fear of leaving any out, and because I'll trust you know who you are.)
I was sending epic emails, mostly into the void, when Russell asked my sister Gemma if she knew of anyone with "things to say" who would like to "write a blog." That first message from Russell seemed so unfathomable that I let it sit in my inbox for a week or so. Where it sat, winking at me, saying "Go on, you know you want to."
I did. I didn't know who I was writing to, at first, but I knew I had something to say, and I had to say something. Well, lots of little somethings (and usually about three times as many somethings as I actually ended up posting over the years... write long, edit hard*).
In the very early days, with nothing but the wee CONTACT button at the bottom of each post, so many people wrote back to share their thoughts and experiences -- I gained marvellous penpals all over the world, who amplified and expanded my thoughts and possibilities. Each blog post would bring a small flurry of mail, and while I'm not sure if I always replied to each and every message (I tried!), each one was gratefully received. There were messages from familiar names, old friends, a few legendary names, and many many new names. Electronic gifts, every one. So much contact!
Once, at a slightly stressful time, a very real care package of NZ bickies arrived all the way from the other side of the world; in the same delivery was a bespoke piece of art from another PA penpal. They felt so physically emblematic of the comfort and generosity to be found in a community like this -- precious, tangible manifestations of the sweet, artsy goodness of Russell's welcoming kitchen-(slash-studiopartyspace) -of-the-mind.
And then when PA System came along, the discussions became broader and noisier and funnier and more controversial and social and different and exciting and always educational. So much discussion! And the real-life meet-ups began; more examples of the unstinting generosity and curiosity of this fascinating crew. Putting faces to names, and hugs to personalities, has been a delight. You are so kind. You know who you are.
And now, even as I've come back to the homeland and been steadily perfecting the rare art of slow-blogging (erm, all right, perhaps even stationary-blogging), and spending more time writing elsewhere, Public Address is still the village square I stroll through regularly to listen to the chatter, see what's happening in the world, admire the architecture, share the outrage, plot the revolution, spot new faces in town, and find connections to other views and places.
It's a wonderful, wonderful place. Thank you to everyone who has made it what it is!
*wrote long, didn't edit this time
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Reykjavik, 2007
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Nothing subliminal about the icing, nuh-uh.
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As a stress baker with no time to bake today, all I can bring to this discussion is a copy and paste of how I coped last election. With carbs.
Made some $$ for the PTA (our local school was a polling booth) and maybe helped win it for Obama, who knows…
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While two boys dug two holes.
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And I found a stick that reminded me of something.
