Social Media as a Therapist

In the last few years our family has had a few tough losses thrown at it.  First my nephew and sisters son James, who at 38 lost his battle with brain cancer and left behind his wife and two young children. For James there was a well attended service and this helped  family and friends say their goodbyes, altho for the immediate family it has been a much harder task.  We all miss James, he was well loved by all who knew him.

More recently, our mother passed away.  The loss has left a hole in each of her six children’s lives.  A gaping hole and a hole that’s different for each of us.  For our mother there was no service (she did not want one), and no one seemed able to pull anything together immediately following her death. There will be a family celebration of her life  on the 1 year anniversary date of her death, where I know many stories will be shared and a good deal of rye and ginger toasted in her honour.

But to me a year seemed like a long way off.  Early one morning it occurred to me that I could use the social media giant Facebook  to help remember our mother and not wait all those many months for closure.   Sorting thru my photo albums this past year I had compiled quite a stack of family pictures from years gone by.  Old pictures of us as very young children with each other or by ourselves and the truly valuable ones with our parents.  There began a picture posting frenzy, using Facebook as our platform, that lasted the good part of a week.  “Did you see that one, do you remember when, oh my God your hair, you look so cute, you look so much like your mother, dad, brother, sister” were only a few of the comments shared.

Would we have been able to interact like we have, if it was 20 years earlier, at a time before Facebook?  Definitely  not.  And so I am grateful to have the technology available that has allowed the interaction and hoped for healing of six people living far apart.  Pictures can be therapeutic.  They have the capacity to stir up old memories and the accompanying feelings of happiness, joy, sadness, jealously, regret, and yes even anger.  The ability to feel is a good thing, it means you’re alive and you care about the world around you.  So I will keep the pictures coming because as they say, a single picture tells a thousand stories.

FORGET THE POLES?!

For a while now I’ve been thinking about all the gear I’m going to need when I walk the Portuguese Camino in May 2015.  Since I’ll be there at a good time of the year – supposedly not too cold, I will be able to get by with packing less and lighter, or so the assumption is.  Everywhere I look online, people have their own ideas of what they need, think they need, don’t need, took and didn’t use, and of course wished they had brought.  These lists are very valuable to me and I thank everyone that has taken the time to put them together.  My own list then is going to be a compilation from the lists of others and will also be based on my own common sense and experiences.

For instance, while hiking the Durrand Glacier (British Columbia, Canada) this past summer with the good folks of the Selkirk Mountain Experience, I noticed how everyone (13 people) on the  trip (except me) had brought their own set of hiking poles.  The majority of people were from Alberta and of course as they commented, BC is the Albertan’s playground.  Here they  find all the glorious mountains they could wish for.  So it’s not surprising they would come well equipped with their high tech poles – they being the people from the flat lands of the Prairies.  Myself on the other hand, brought no such item and for the most part got by quite well on the steam of my own legs.  Only once did I think I could have benefited from a pole or two, and that was for balance as we stopped and started across a slightly treacherous ridge of snow.  Other than that one episode however, there was no apparent reason I could see for having poles.  Two of the male hikers decided on the 3rd and final day to also leave their poles behind.

Now as I contemplate the Camino, I am again faced with the question – should I leave the  poles behind?  Just go with the lighter pack and see how I do?  Or do I give  into my fear of being an ill-equipped hiker and add those darn poles onto my shopping list – right next to the security blanket?  Right now I’m leaning towards ditching the poles.   I understand there are a lot of cobblestone roads and that I will be facing many days of walking.  But it’s not like I’m walking the French Camino with the Pyrenees Mountains thrown in.  My knees are good and I will be trained up for the walk.  The Portuguese Camino is relatively flat, there are no mountain ranges to cross and certainly no snow.  We shall see what ends up on my own list. Hopefully poles will not be the item I wished I’d brought…..

Is blogging contagious?

Well look at me, day 1 of Blogging 101 and doing my first assignment – writing, also known as blogging. Why am I blogging? A very good question. I think after reading so many good blogs other people have written, I just kind of caught the bug. The plan is to walk the Portuguese Camino next May and I’d like a more permanent record of the journey. I don’t have the best sense of direction so it will also be a way for my friends and family to keep track of me – hopefully I won’t be lost in the Eucalyptus forests for too long. Maybe I’ll even connect with a few fellow pilgrims. There is a lot of preparation involved and I’ve begun with the reading of other peoples experiences – thank you to all that have shared, are sharing and will share. Information is so valuable and I hope to do my share of sharing also.