Lessons learned

I've come to love some of the people who are listed in my blogroll. I know very few of the people writing the blogs in the sidebar personally (about, uhm, three). The others I've found through a combination of serendipity and professional research. Some of the ones I love the most have no idea how much I rely on hearing from them on a regular basis.

Understand when I say 'love' it doesn't mean that I'll be ditching Beast, Sparky and Buddy and taking Amtrak to Texarkana so I can move in with Joe-Bob and his pet bluetick, Scritch. In this case, love is how I feel when I read their words. It's so heartening to see that there are so many literate, witty, smart (and not 'just' book-smart) people 'out there.' I admire many of them from a strictly professional point of view, others I find downright amusing, and some I read just to have a 'click' moment, a reality check, a burst of "I never thought of that." And, to be honest, at times reading the blogs makes me feel younger than 42-almost-43, when ya'll aren't saying stuff to make me feel fuckingold!

The upside of that latter feeling is the exact obverse of it: I am older than many (most) of the bloggers I read, usually by at least a decade, sometimes by almost 20 years. Usually, the only reason I would know--or assume--that is when someone mentions their age, or the year they graduated from college (1994??) or the year they were born (1979?? Dear God...I could have been your mom!). Age is just a number. I work with a 25-year-old and a 92-year-old. And a lot of women between 50 and 65, some of whom should retire NOW and others I hope never do.

But sometimes, as we Blog People are wont to do, people go off on a tangent that is so...unintentionally...youthful...that it makes me laugh. And cry. And realize that, yeah, I remember learning that lesson (and sometimes, no, I never had to learn that lesson, and maybe I should have, but I just knew it internally, or somehow survived anyway). Sometimes my heart aches. Sometimes I roll my eyes (not as frequently as all that) and VERY occasionally I say out loud, "Oh, JesusGod, get OVER yourself!" I've learned an awful lot from the Blog People in the past couple of years; in fact, I've probably grown more as a person since I started this than I have any right to expect.

So thanks for all the fish, everyone.