Cyclical color in a snowy land

We woke up to this today. Not the bike sitting on the lawn, but snow. And even then, just a sprinkling, a taste of what's to come. And it'll probably melt off by lunchtime.

I don't tend to fret about changing weather. It's going to happen no matter what we do, so we may as well adapt and move on. Better to focus on the things we can change.

Still, I felt a slight pang of sadness on seeing my garish pink machine juxtaposed against the now-almost-monochrome landscape. Whether I like it or not, another biking season is inevitably drawing to a close, and with it, my self-powered radius gets a little smaller. One cycle begets another...I'm just glad I'm here to experience it all.

Your turn: What are you thankful for?

On the not-so-lowly turtle

"Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out."
James Conant

I had a turtle once, long ago. She eventually outgrew every habitat we bought for her, and ultimately needed a ginorous aquarium. My old room had shag carpeting - blame my parents - with a bizarro blue/green pattern to it, and whenever she escaped, she'd disappear, chameleon-like. I'd have to lie carefully on the bed for fear of accidentally squishing her. Eventually, after feeling around the floor, I'd find her and return her. Until her next escape.

Long after she went to the great turtle riviera in the sky, I had an inspirational turtle experience in a faraway place. And to this day, these funny-looking, super-slow beings from a seemingly distant past still manage to fascinate me. I'm not so great at the neck-sticking-out thing, but I figure if a turtle can do it, I can, too.

Your turn: How do you explain the ongoing appeal of turtles?

Thematic Photographic 173 - Flash of Color

Duck, duck...goose?
London, ON, November 2011

I'm not particularly fond of this shot. I had just discovered this little spot by the river. It was one of those in-between moments where I had a bit of time to kill while waiting for the little man's choir practice to end. I lost track of time as I wandered the pathways nearby, and had begun putting my camera away after realizing I had wandered a little too far and would now have to double-time it back to pick him up on time.

Of course, that was precisely the moment the ducks chose to take off from the water and make a spectacle of themselves. I was completely out of position, completely unprepared and completely late. I grabbed my camera from the bag and wildly shot whatever I could until they disappeared around the bend.

I'll have to return to this idyllic spot sometime soon. Next time, I'll be ready for whatever the ducks have planned.

Your turn: Please share a photo that reflects this week's theme, flash of color. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Come on back through the week and visit other participants to share the photographic joy. Thematic Photographic is our little weekly photo-exploration exercise, and everyone who's interested in expanding their photographic world view is welcome to join in the fun. For more info on how TP works, click here.

May the Q be with us

Social media tools can be used for a lot of really ridiculous purposes. For example:

• Playing endless rounds of FarmVille when you really should be working.
• Bugging complete strangers to play endless rounds of FarmVille when they really should be working.
• Sharing waaaaay too much information about your child's intestinal functions.
• Sharing waaaaay too much information about your own intestinal functions.
• Enlightening countless "friends" on the state of your relationship with your soon-to-be estranged mother-in-law.
• Assuming Facebook "friends" are, in fact, friends.

At the same time, social media can be a force for good. To wit, an Ontario campaign to get CBC broadcaster Jian Ghomeshi to do his live radio show, Q, locally. Mr. Ghomeshi is a multimedia superstar, an accomplished musician (Moxy Fruvous) and passionate mentor for Canada's next generation of talent. And he's got a lot of rabid fans who would give their eye teeth for a live-in-person visit.

The rules for this Internet era contest are simple: Mr. Ghomeshi and his show will visit the city that markets itself most effectively. So Facebookers, Twitterers and bloggers are now slugging it out online to get Mr. Ghomeshi's attention (London's Facebook page is here...bonus points if you follow the link and like it, double-bonus points if you start using the #JianinLdnont hashtag.)

True to our Canadian form, the campaigns are good-natured and light-hearted. Win or lose, I'm guessing the sense of community that's grown out of this large-scale process will pay off well beyond one radio show in one town. On second thought, maybe that's been Mr. Ghomeshi's goal all along.

Coolness.

Your turn: Are you involved in this? Got a link you want us to share here? Go for it...

I'll start the ball rolling:

• My Ghomeshi'a Twitter handle, @jianghomeshi (follow him and say hello.)
• A YouTube video featuring some folks I know, some folks I don't, all of whom I'm deeply in awe of.
• A blog post by my friend, Janice, who I think must be Mr. Ghomeshi's Biggest Fan Ever. Her blog, btw, rocks.
• Another blog post by Janice. Just-published and completely hilarious. A must-read if you're a Kermit fan.
• Jianinldnont.ca: A great website started by London social media expert Jody Bailey. Here's the blog post he wrote about us!
  

Row upon row of emptiness

Before gametime
London, ON, November 2011

Quick note: This photo wraps up our "muted" theme - click here if you'd like to make one last contribution. New Thematic theme, "flash of color", launches tonight at 7:00 Eastern.

When a stadium - in this case, London's TD Waterhouse Stadium - is packed with screaming fans, it has an energy that can't be explained, broadcast or written about. You have to be there to truly experience it, to feel it with every sense you've got, and even some you don't.

When the stands are empty, however, it's easy to imagine a tuft or two of tumbleweed blowing almost silently past, a reminder that a house isn't a home until it's filled with people. None of this means there's any less meaning to the empty state (these places, after all, spend the vast majority of their lives sitting still, waiting for the crowds to arrive) but it does serve as a reminder to pay attention to the quiet as much as anything else.

Your turn: What is the appeal of quiet?

Help Desk Rules

I've been a geek as long as I can remember. And part of being a geek is being the go-to guy for friends and family whenever they've got a question or a problem with technology. I'm cool with that, of course, as it's my basic nature to want to help. Heck, once upon a time, I ran actual help desks for actual companies. So it's clearly in my blood, and I'm always happy to pitch in.

There's a "but" coming, though. I knew you could sense that.

First, a bit of a level-set: The vast majority of folks are nice as can be. They say please and thank you, and I know they genuinely appreciate whatever I can do. I'd spend every spare minute working with these people, because it makes me feel great to know I can get them going again. They represent 99.9% of the folks I deal with. So, no, chances are you're just fine.

Unfortunately, some folks - let's call them the other 0.1% - aren't fine. Sometimes, they're not as nice about the whole process as they probably could be. Sometimes, they can be annoying, selfish, or a little bit of both. And because I'm Canadian, I'm going to assume they have no awareness of their oafish conduct (or read this blog, or subscribe to my Twitter feed, or...) So please indulge me for a bit as I run down a few common-sense rules to keep in mind when approaching your friendly personal help desk person:

1. Be polite to me. Say please, thank you, and any other word of kindness you can come up with. I don't need you to fawn all over me, but I could also do without outright rudeness, too. I'm also not averse to the occasional smile when we speak. Show that you care. And even if you don't, please pretend to. Because I have a lot more fun working with friendly folks than unfriendly ones. Oh, and don't ever - and I do mean ever - treat me like the hired help. Please.
   
2. Be polite to my family. I'm usually not the first person to reach the phone when it rings (shoot me, I'm slow.) If my wife answers, for example, and you rudely brush her off in your panicked quest to get to me, I can guarantee you she won't be pleased. Neither will I. Believe me when I say I completely understand your frustration. We've all been there, after all. But don't take it out on anyone around me. Oh, and don't treat my wife like the help, either.
   
3. Respect my time. If you call me all breathless because your kid flushed your BlackBerry for the third time this week, please listen to my initial response. If I tell you I'm preparing for a conference call in three minutes, kindly recognize that my need to earn a livelihood for my wife and kids trumps your smartphone emergency. Similarly, if I tell you the flu-like symptoms I've been experiencing preclude my talking on the phone right now, please let me get off the phone before I lose my lunch in the middle of the living room. Allow me to set a time and method that'll let me ponder your issue and get back to you in an appropriate manner. If you make me miss that call - or that interview, or that tuck-in - we're going to have a problem.
4. Respect my sleep. Kindly limit your calls to the usual times when my family would likely be awake. 7:05 a.m. on Sunday or after midnight during the week? Unless someone died, my phone really shouldn't be ringing then. I'm pretty sure your frozen iPad can wait till morning. Much later in the morning.
   
5. Get back to me. Please have the courtesy of letting me know at some future point in time how everything worked out. Did my suggestions solve your problem? I can't tell you how many times I've carefully crafted detailed answers in email only to have the recipient never respond in kind. See Rule #1: I don't do this for anything in return, but even a quick "thank-you" or "got it" would be enough. I have negative free time as it is. If you can't take the time to close the loop, I can guarantee you I won't make the same mistake twice.
   
6. Listen to me. If I ask you to try something, try it. Time and again, I'll make suggestion after suggestion, only to have my advice ignored. Inevitably, the phone rings a few minutes, hours or even weeks later because It's Still Not Working. I'm trying to help you. If you have no intention of listening to me, please let me know in advance so I can reallocate my time accordingly.
7. Don't monopolize me. If you bump into me when I'm out and about, please try to avoid peppering me with one question after another, or buttonholing me with stories of your latest tech disaster. When you steal me for the 20 minutes when I'd rather just be chatting with my wife or watching my kids do whatever it is that they do, you're stealing 20 minutes I'm not going to get back. I don't want to sound rude, but this is my only free time. And I don't really care how many hours you've put into the latest Call of Duty episode, or that you're still mulling over that laptop purchase you've been nagging me about for the last six months. I'll nod my head politely because, well, I'm being polite. But secretly, you're really ticking me off.
   
8. Don't one-up me. I occasionally get questions from folks who want to prove how tech-savvy they are, and more nastily want to knock the vaunted geek guy down a peg. Go ahead and have your fun, but recognize that I do this because I really want to help, not because I need to get into a pissing match with anyone. If you're going to violate the spirit of the thing - namely that I just want to help good folks who want and need it - then find someone else's time to waste.
9. Don't try to grow my market. I often get calls and emails from people I don't know. Or from someone who lived three doors down from me when I was a toddler and heard from a friend of of a friend that I know a thing or two about computers. If you're a well-meaning friend, please don't give out my contact information to anyone because "Carmi will help anyone." Feel free to let me know who these near-strangers are, and allow me to decide how to proceed.
10. No proxies. Don't leave detailed messages with my wife, my kids, or my mother. If you have a question for me, then ask me directly. Please don't rope anyone else into it and please don't force any of them to take down detailed messages outlining the recent changes to your registry and their potential impact on system performance.
    
11. No guilt. If you leave me a message and I don't get back to you Right Now, resist the urge to leave a second, nastier message. And when you get me live, do not berate me for not being immediately available. I work long hours. My schedule is often rather unpredictable. I'm usually fighting one deadline after another. I'm not always successful in doing so. Sometimes I get home long after the kids are in bed and wonder what the hell happened that day. I'm likely not ignoring you. Rather, I'm simply doing what I need to do to get by. Kinda like you. Don't guilt me for not dropping everything to rocket your request to the top of my priority list.
    
12. Don't slag me if it doesn't work out. I'm not omniscient. Sometimes, I can't fix it. Sometimes I'll recommend that your 13-year-old first-generation Pentium machine running Windows 98 really should be put out of its misery because, no, it just can't handle the latest version of PhotoShop. Respect my judgment when I tell you your only viable option is a trip to the Best Buy for some new hardware.
13. If you know someone better, please feel free to call him. Or her. Everyone's got a brilliant-but-socially-challenged teenaged nephew who "just knows everything about computers." If you're going to ask me for help out of one side of your mouth, and brag about how he'd solve your little problem "in two seconds flat", then please feel free to redirect your request his way*. If he's a wiz with Windows 98-running Pentium machines, he's your guy. And no worries, I promise I won't be offended.
    
14. Pay it forward. As you've likely guessed, I'd never charge friends or family for any of this, as it's just not my thing to think of this as anything but a freebie. That said, I hope my taking the time to help makes enough of an impression that those I help are inspired to assist others as well. Say yes when others ask your for help, any help, and step forward to offer whenever the opportunity presents itself. It's a pretty good feeling, and the world needs more sharing.
    

I'll apologize if some of this makes me seem more than a little curmudgeonly, as this is clearly not my intent. But if you ever find yourself in the position of asking a friend for any kind of assistance, I hope you'll keep this stuff in mind. Little things matter, and being nice makes all the difference.

Your turn: Thoughts?

* This, and all scenarios touched on here, actually happened to me. Names and other identifiable specifics have been deleted to protect the oafish.

On the wisdom of Pooh

"There is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."
Winnie the Pooh

I always loved Pooh. And Eeyore. And the whole 100 Acre Wood thing. Wouldn't the world be a better place if we were more like them?

To drink or not to drink

Lonely
London, ON, November 2011

About this photo. Thematic. Muted. Here.

On a forgotten stretch of wall along the forgotten underside of the football stadium on the university campus here, you can drink all the water you want. Or not. Water fountains have always made me a little nervous.

I was here with our daughter to watch her high school football teams play in a couple of season-ending championship games. It's her first year in high school, and she couldn't wait to see her classmates hit the field. She's a kid who understands the meaning of spirit, so despite the cold, windy greyness that blanketed the day, we headed off to the stadium and settled in for some ball.

I learned a number of things on this day:

• Hot chocolate isn't just a tasty-if-fattening treat. It's a mode of survival for Great White North football fans.
• Some parents make the ugliest fans. Leaning over the railing and screaming at your kid to "stop being a wuss" won't win you the parent-of-the-year trophy.
  
• Marching bands are a wonderful addition to a day at the stadium.
• Not so much when they're sitting right behind you.
• Bare metal bleachers are a bad idea. Forgetting pillows and/or blankets? Even worse.
• Dogs can be football fans, too.
• I can think of few people I'd rather hang around with than this kid. I knew this before, of course, but it's nice to be reminded.

Two thrilling, down-to-the-wire victories later, it was time to head home. By this point I couldn't feel my fingers, but I didn't care as it had been a thoroughly sweet day with my munchkin. As we walked among the boisterous crowd out the back of the stadium, the sun came out and cast a shadow against the bare concrete block. Dahlia almost instinctively slowed down, knowing full well that I couldn't resist taking one last shot.

She gets me.

Your turn: So do you drink from public water fountains?

Growing in no one's garden

In the wild
London, ON, November 2011

The more time I spend outside in the murky grey weeks between the brightest autumn colors and the first snowfall (can't believe I just said that), the more I realize how much color remains. I know it isn't that brilliant, smack-you-in-the-face intensity of a tree seemingly on fire with red, but that doesn't mean it can't have an impact all its own.

It's a more subtle kind of color, a quieter message, a softer form of loveliness that doesn't reach out to us as much as it quietly asks us to lean a little closer. So on this not-so-bright, not-so-warm Sunday morning, I buttoned my coat up, tightened up my scarf and shuddered as the dampness reached inside anyway. And I slowed down, because I found I had to look harder to find what I was looking for.

As I composed the photo you see above, it occurred to me that the whole subtle-color thing extends well beyond photography.

Your turn: What do you see when you slow down and lean in?

One more thing: Click here for more muted Thematic.

On living life well

"Life well spent is long."
Leonardo Da Vinci

Conceptually, I'd like to believe in Mr. Da Vinci's words. I'd like to think that the only thing that should matter is not how many years we're given, but what we do with them. I'd like to think that a relatively brief life packed with accomplishment, substance and inspiration is preferable to a relatively long one spent in the lonely shadows of mere existence.

I'd like to think a lot of things on this murky morning, but this will have to do while I get on with the business of trying to make my own years count just a little more.

Your turn: How are you ensuring your own life is spent well?

Muted landscape

Just passing through
Somewhere in Tennessee, December 2008

About this photo: Thematic explores muted this week. You can, too, by clicking here.

The scene: We're on our way to Florida in the days before flight. The wondervan is packed to the gills with our kids and their gear. And us. I'm hanging in the passenger seat, playing with my camera in the few-minute window before I get nauseous and have to put the thing away. My wife's a great driver, but I still hate being a passenger, so little diversions like this are good for my sleep-deprived soul.

The sky is oddly threatening, alternating between thick cloud and slices of brilliant sun. The highway - known as I-75 - runs through the rolling country, hills swelling on either side of the vehicle. At first I curse them - nicely, of course, lest the children hear - because I really want a decent picture of the sky and blurry land isn't really helping. Then I figure by silhouetting the streaking landscape, I may just get the shutter speed high enough to freeze everything and make it look like I wasn't just crossing my fingers and shooting out the car window.

As I work through the settings and review the results of each flight of photos, the sun pokes through the clouds with rays that remind me of G-d peeking at us from above. I'm not one to sprout Scripture or anything, but there's something remarkably humbling about watching this kind of show from on high. I line up for one last round of pictures and wonder if moments like this are less random than fate.

Your turn: The first three words that come to mind when you see this picture are...?

One more thing: I've got a thing for edge-on pictures that reduce the landscape to a flat strip of barely-there features. I caught this one in Colorado, and it remains one of my all-time favorites.

On bleeding a certain shade of blue

"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."
Dante Alighieri

I keep waiting for the furor over Penn State to die down. Alums and other stakeholders have been going on national television to whine about how their school's legacy has been destroyed. Fans of Joe Paterno have agonized over his firing. Fans have been going to football games amid fears of pre- and post-game violence. Or they've been boycotting them. Whatever.

Newsflash, people: I realize there's an entire case yet to play out in court, but the allegations, if proven, involve perpetrators and their victims. If found guilty, the perpetrators deserve to be punished. The victims deserve all the support their communities, friends and families can provide. This is pretty much all that matters here. Everything else is merely a circus-like distraction.

If you got your degree from Penn State, or if you tailgated in the school's blue-colored uniforms before a game, I'm quite sorry to inform you that you really shouldn't be ripping your own clothes and claiming victimhood. Your degree isn't devalued by the alleged acts of a sexual predator you probably never even met. Your favorite team isn't sullied by the fact that those in positions of responsibility may have turned the other way and not done all they could to stop the abuse. Oops, alleged abuse.

Yes, the institution has some 'splaining to do insofar as whether it did enough to protect its students and stakeholders. It also needs to change itself to ensure this never recurs. But, again, and I direct this at the Penn State grads from 1972 claiming this has destroyed their lives, this has nothing to do with you. Please get on with your lives and leave the airwaves to an expected wave of Regis-wannabes and clones of The View. Or is it The Talk?

So, the lesson here is simple: Fight acts of darkness like these with everything you've got. Be there for the victims and do everything you can to build a better world where kids aren't victimized by those in positions of power, and those in positions of power don't protect the abusers. Do something to fix whatever you see that's broken - tikkun olam, remember? - but please stop saying any of this has anything to do with you. It doesn't. Get over it.

Your turn: Thoughts?

Disclosure: I attended two Montreal-based schools, Dawson College and Concordia University, that were the scenes of deadly shootings. Both were perpetrated by freaks who were clearly off the scale of normal behavior. Neither incident made me any less proud to have been associated with these institutions.

Thematic Photographic 172 - Muted

Getting ready for winter
London, ON, November 2011

About this photo: We're launching our newest Thematic theme, muted, and we hope you'll join in. Click here for more background.

I'll start by apologizing for not being the most gracious of blog hosts of late. I haven't been visiting other Thematic participants this week. Come to think of it, I haven't been visiting anyone else's sites, either. I hope you understand, and I hope you continue to take part in Thematic even if I'm laying low for a few more days.

I went for a walk in the woods by the river yesterday, ostensibly to clear my head and reconnect with the forces of life that tend to go unnoticed in the urban everyday. I noticed how far beyond peak color we are, and how the now-almost-bare branches seem to be waiting for the inevitable first snow. As if they're ready for winter, ready to be buried for a while.

When I first set out for my walk through this greyish landscape, I thought it would be devoid of beauty. I thought blazing autumn color was the only thing worth capturing. It didn't take long to realize I was wrong. Beauty takes many forms, and when it's a little more subtle after the leaves fall and turn a crunchy brown, you just have to look a little harder for it.

It was worth the time. I think I'll take another walk next week. Who's game to join in?

Your turn: Take a photo - muted theme, which can be interpreted any way you wish - and post it to your blog. Or find something muted that you may have already shared. Leave a comment here letting folks know where to find it. Visit other participants and repeat as often as you wish all week long. For more background on how Thematic Photographic, our weekly photo-sharing extravaganza, works, click here.

Bridge over some kind of water

It is neither white, nor stone. Please discuss.
New York, NY, March 2011

About this photo: We're celebrating classic this week, and from where I sit few examples of large-scale engineering are more classic that a sparingly designed suspension bright like the Whitestone Bridge seen here. To share your own classic vision, please click here.

Pre-takeoff is an interesting time to be in a plane. Wait, I lie. Any time is an interesting time to be in a plane. Cave-dwelling terrorists and terrorist-wannabes notwithstanding - and for the record, let's state right now that these morons are laughing at us every time a shoe-bomber, underwear-bomber or eyeglass-bomber forces another hideously expensive and inconvenient security layer onto an already-overburdened means of travel - there's a cool feeling of anticipation associated with the few moments before hundreds of thousands of pounds of super-high-tech airplane leaves the earth for a few hours.

I like to stare out the window before the pilot floors it and points us toward the sky. Call it tradition or habit or just plain geek-OCD. Whatever it is, it grounds me and, as a bit of a bonus, often presents decent-enough photo opps. Airports aren't always the prettiest landscapes - and LaGuardia probably takes the cake for ugliness - but even the most forgettable facilities seem to offer up enough diversity to make the effort worthwhile.

For Exhibit A, allow me to present the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge. It's a structure I know well from childhood, as we crossed it every time my parents drove us to visit my aunt and uncle. Even if it was the middle of the night and we were sleeping, my father would wake us up so we could stare wide-eyed at this enormously beautiful Depression-era achievement as we slipped beneath its huge cables and towers.

Othmar Ammann* designed this bridge. His work literally dominates the New York area, with a total of seven major spans, all of which reflect a simple elegance that was a total departure from earlier heavy-set approaches to bridge building. I've fast-shot his work before (The George Washington Bridge, blog entry here) and if I'm lucky, I'll get back down there again soon for some more quality time with these icons of engineering history.

Your turn: Got a building or structure that sticks out in your mind? Why?

--
*Mr. Ammann also wrote an influential study of the collapse of the Quebec Bridge, which I was lucky enough to visit this summer (here). I find it enormously neat how all these little things manage to connect themselves.

On what hopefully lies beyond

"While we are mourning the loss of our friend, others are rejoicing to meet him behind the veil."
John Taylor

Saying goodbye to the day

In the fading light
London, ON, September 2011

It's been an odd few days around here, the upshot being that I haven't had a whole lot to say. Sometimes, life just does that. It tosses you an unseen curve and you're left standing there wondering what the hell just happened. And when the answers don't come, the little voices inside my head sometimes decide to take a bit of a siesta.

All of this leaves me staring at cursors on blank screens for extended periods of time. And wondering when the muse will kick back into gear and turn me once again into a writer. Or at least a wannabe-writer. Because sometimes it's okay to wobble a little bit. I'm lucky enough that every time that seems to happen, things snap back into place soon enough.

It's when that loop doesn't get closed - for me or for anyone who matters to me - that I begin to worry. But for now I can't control any of that. It is what it is, and I'm glad I'm still here to ponder it.

Your turn: How do you get back on your game after you've been thrown off of it?

One more thing: I'm not feeling particularly Thematic right about now. In case you are, however, it continues here.

On grief

"Man, when he does not grieve, hardly exists."
Antonio Porchia

I'm beginning to think that life is a constant process of managing - and learning to live with - loss. No wonder so many of the well-aged wear the years so haggardly on their faces: They've lost so much, and so many, along the way.

Your turn: Is there a silver lining to grief?

A star you can touch

Steal me
London, ON, June 2011

About this photo: It's Thematic's classic week. Head here to jump in.

Thank you all for your kind thoughts in the wake of yesterday, a day many of us would rather forget. A friend from high school, comedian and writer Stewart Silver, passed away very suddenly, and we're still trying to understand something that, frankly, can't be understood.

This is the first loss from my high school class, and the statistical reality that not all of us will live full lives is now sickeningly real. I know that the proverbial clock begins ticking the moment our lives flicker into being, but that still doesn't make it any easier to logically comprehend. It just isn't logical to begin with.

When I'm feeling challenged by the universe, I tend to pull back into the things that bring me comfort. Family, writing, photography, media. I idly tickle my laptop's keyboard, waiting for the moment when the words begin to flow. I look through pictures I've taken and try to remember what it felt like when I was looking through the viewfinder. Tonight, I came up with this one, as it isn't only a classic icon of the automotive industry. It's a reminder of a warm late-spring evening spent waiting for our daughter to return home from a faraway trip.

Memories of moments like this mean so much more when you realize how easily it can all be taken away.

Your turn: What do you cherish?

Friends don't die, do they?

In the ideal world, they don't. But this is the real world, and yesterday's news that a friend from high school had died confirmed just how unfair the real world can be.

I have no words to explain how a guy who's always looked out for others, who had carved out a tremendous reputation as a comedian and writer, who was on his way to New York to do even bigger things, can suddenly be removed from the earth. We can ask "why?" until we're blue in the face and the answers will never come.

I'm glad I got to see him when he came to town to perform. I'm glad our lives crossed when we were kids, and again as we segued into adulthood. I'm left thinking he had so much more to do.

I hugged my family a little tighter last night, and again when they woke up today. I'm thinking about everyone whose lives we touch, and am wondering if we're all doing enough to stay connected, to let them know they matter. Because they do. He did.

Damn.

Buried

It's been an insane week, with my family wondering where I've gone and my dog enjoying the empty spots where I usually sit or sleep. Which is my lame excuse for not having anything more fascinating to share this morning. I had all sorts of grand plans to wake up early and write brilliant stuff for the vlog. Instead, I did a couple of live interviews with Canada AM before heading to the office. Another day in the life...and I wouldn't change a thing.