I feel that even a year ago it was unheard of to know your doctor’s email address – let alone think you could email them and HEAR BACK from them via email (your mileage may vary). As far as I was concerned, doctors just didn’t use email; customer service, be damned.

I used to have to speak to a human to schedule an appointment. Now, I can schedule (or reschedule) one online at 3am when i’m thinking about it instead of waiting for business hours and hope I get through.

Probably the biggest shift I noted, though, with my recent visits is the records management piece. At one place, I signed my HIPA forms, read the financial assistance information, and other documentation at a privacy-shielded computer at the corner of the front desk. I even signed everything like I was signing for my credit card at the grocery store.

Even if the forms weren’t 100% electronic, EVERY. SINGLE. OFFICE. had one of these guys. I mean, I have one too (similar model) and it’s the greatest tool i have to handle the household paper monster – and maybe i’d just been going to really old-school docs before – but i feel like i went from seeing these nowhere in docs offices to seeing them in every. single. one. Rock on, medical professionals. (I should have been a portable scanner sales rep within the last five years.)

That scanning piece also helped a ton when needing test results being sent to another doctor. I remember as a kid, my mom always asking for results to be faxed somewhere in addition to getting a copy for herself so she could manage things if the communication failed somewhere without having to re-contact anyone.

At another office not only was my paperwork all electronic but my scans were also right there on the monitor for me to see and the doc to manipulate (think the arrows, circles and lines sports casters draw for us to understand what’s going on in a football game). Coloring, contrast and enlargements were possible right there in front of me. No more mental images of the doc holding patient-confusing xrays to the florescent light.

Even at the Maryland Library Association Conference in May, Dr. Jay Parkinson will be speaking about all this – People would visit his website; see his Google calendar; choose a time and input their symptoms; his iPhone would alert him; he’d make a house call; they’d pay him via Paypal; and he’d follow-up by e-mail. IM, video chat, or in person. Doctor of the Future, indeed. (See his talk at TEDxMidAtlantic in 2011)

It’s a brave new world, folks.

All that said, not every office was as high tech, high touch as the next. Phone menus continued to be long and arduous and sometimes getting a person, almost impossible on the first try. But big strides are happening and it’s awesome.

Still, all this tech can’t replace a doctor that takes their time with you, answers your questions (or better, explains things before you ask or when you can’t ask) and provides reassurance or comfort. Some things, only humans can provide.

—-
on a side note – i feel like i’m the only one who reads all those admittance forms straight through before i sign them. Docs, summarizing it for me is helpful, but doesn’t mean I’m going to skip the reading piece. If you want me to sign, (and sign and sign and sign.. i may have only signed more for my mortgage) then I have to read. Patience, please.

possibly related posts:

1. Google as Big Brother?
2. if it can go wrong, it will.

While walking through, you can usually find me snapping photos of design ideas for changing the house *yet again* and eventually, before I end up at the exit, I’ll have had the sudden “need” to purchase a small, usually cheap, organizational apparatus or *yet another* sheet set or kitchen item to make my house (and life) finally click. Today, however, i was already more than halfway through the showroom before i realized – not only had i absolutely no desire to buy anything, i suddenly saw the big picture and the whole key to the perfectly organized house and life.

You don’t need organizational tools, bins or schemas to help you organize if you just have less stuff.

I mean, my “epiphany” might be your “duh” moment, but this definitely was an “ah-ha” moment for me when the last few years suddenly just came together. Here’s how i think i finally ended up here:

I’m pretty sure it all started with high fructose corn syrup. Hang with me for a sec, this will all make sense soon. However I got on the HFCS kick, about 3-4 years ago i decided to take a stand against the rampant use of HFCS in everything and start reading labels and only buying things with sugar in them. Let me just tell you how annoyed i was to find HFCS in my cough medicine and my beloved childhood brand of apple sauce. Starting out, everything in my fridge with HFCS in it, got an X on it  and when it ran out, i’d look for an HFCS-free alternative- and let me tell you, that was not easy. Today, however, companies have gotten the memo and you can find plenty of “throwback,” “classic” or similarly branded items with sugar, like they used to have.

After that came the rest of my diet… I had read Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food and it opened my eyes (again) to the eating local and more consciously concept that somehow, over the years, had gotten lost in my life. Around the same time, a friend of mine invited me to a screening of FRESH at a nearby church where local growers, raisers, and makers of food were set up and my whole life changed. I learned about CSA’s and since that very moment we’ve been completely ignoring the existence of the middle of the grocery store (if not the grocery store all together), buying meat only from happy grass fed cows* or happy roaming chickens, making sure our milk and eggs are from said happy animals and buying what we can at local farm stands and markets for the fruits and veggies. I’m still working on a source of cheese, yogurt, and other similar dairy products that meets my now serious requirements (but i’m pretty sure within the year i’ll be making them myself).

Somewhere along the line of the HFCS crusade, the last straw was that i could only find canned mushrooms that were grown in PA (40 miles north), shipped to China for processing and then shipped back for canning. And so began my moratorium on anything made in China. It had the added benefit of making me think i could do my part for the ”carbon crisis, continuing the local idea, and voting with my dollar as far as international trade regulations were concerned (hello lead paint). It didn’t take long to realize that everything we buy is made there and gave me a mental image of a land full of factories, instead of the beautiful China my aunt speaks of from the  70s. Regardless,it is possible to find things made elsewhere (or god forbid in the USA). You may have to look a little harder, pay a little more or simply go without, but i think it’s worth it.

Similarly, i started to bug my normally receptive parents about their use of paper plates and cups over their regular dishes, and their need for paper napkins and paper towels instead of reusable cloth ones (which we’d been using for a few years now). because of the environmental issue (one word: WALL-E). I’m happy to report that I finally won that battle a few weeks ago. My next goal with them is to switch them to biodegradable trash bags.

About two years ago, when we moved to our current place, we learned the county had a very aggressive recycling program that accepted essentially everything (seriously not kidding) without it needing to be rinsed, cleaned, or sorted AT ALL. I’ve always recycled but now we were tossing out a huge bin of recycling and only a tiny half-filled bag of trash each week. If we composted (it’s coming, i can tell), we’d have no trash at all.

So all this is going on in the food and environmental sphere of my life, and over in sphere B, i’m still fighting the seemingly never-ending battle with my stuff. It needs to be organized, cleaned, picked up, and purged CONSTANTLY and it seems that every spare moment i have (not many) includes a to do list that has “organize X” or “clean up Y” right at the top. But even when i did that, it never looked or felt like I had made a dent.

I constantly felt overwhelmed. My home office was a dumping ground and it was a constant battle of moving piles from open spot A to open spot B in order to move something else just to have space to do stuff. Instead of spending time on projects, work, or just doing nothing, i spent time trying to get a hold of the “stuff monster.” We live in plenty of room for two people, but i felt like i was being crowded out.

In an attempts to at least curb the incoming stuff, last Christmas I put serious limits on the gift giving. Gifts is what my dad does. It fills him with joy to buy things that he thinks you will enjoy – and even more joy when he sees you open it on Christmas morning. In fact, until last year when I started imposing those limits on Christmas  (just call me Scrooge), Christmas morning gift giving was an almost all-day affair, each of the three of us taking turns opening one item at a time. But all that stuff takes up space and i was at my mental limit. Dad did okay last year – he tried, he really did- but it was painful and I still ended up with stuff because no one knew how to change the tradition of an all-day gift opening fest when there seemed to be nothing to fill the space with. The boy and I were creative with our own Christmas, however, wrapping games we already owned and playing them after they were unwrapped. This year, i’ve put a COMPLETE MORATORIUM on stuff at Christmas at home. One gift each, if you must at all; high premium on experiences over things; homemade items are good. Things made of plastic, in China, or something that won’t last forever are verboten.

If you’re wondering if my stuff problem extends to the bedroom, it does. The bedroom closet, that is (sheesh, people). A tshirt and jeans girl (& no shoes if i can help it), i never understood or was taught the concept of an outfit. What Not To Wear intrigued me, but always left me mostly baffled when it came time to apply the theory. Mostly solo clothes shopping was basically hell for me, and i continued to buy pieces, instead of seeing the whole picture (which is funny because i’m really good at seeing the whole picture everywhere else in my life and work). This all leaves me with a closet bursting at the seams with things that maybe kinda go together, but not really. And regardless of the things i owned, I still basically wore the same few things. Enter Kendi Everyday. I’ve had Kendi in my rss reader for maybe a year now but only recently have really started to pay attention to her 30 in 30 project – 30 items to make 30 outfits in 30 days. Basically – forcing yourself to see your clothes in a different way, and make them do new things for you. I had the unique ability to wear a skirt and have it still look like my normal tee and jeans uniform- no extra finishing pieces, no accessories, nothing special – slap it on and you’re on your way. But in the last month or so i’ve seen more new combinations in my closet than i have ever. For example, I had no concept of just how different a whole outfit can look just by tucking in a shirt. Bless you, Kendi. (Outfit Mentor status also goes to my friend A whom i very much miss shopping with (especially now that i know what i’m doing.)

So where does this leave us? Well, enter two of the final pieces of the puzzle: 1) my complete abhorrence for my current commute and my intense desire to work closer to where i live / live closer to where i work at some point in the not-so-distant future and 2) my reading of The Feast Nearby (also, a blog). Dreams of living locally, biking around town, knowing my neighbors and canning my own chutneys and whatnot (because with all this local veggie buying, winter is going to suck), everything consolidated for me.

Somehow a life that was never about stuff, turned into one of not just stuff, but complacency and a disconnect from nature as i tried to find my way in the world. I bought into the completely ridiculous idea that if i dressed a certain way, bought into this new productivity practice, or purchased a new thing, something would click and it’d all be okay. But letting go (of expectations, material things, and completely bullshit ideas of the kind of person you have to be to do x, y, or z)… making careful and conscious choices about my life (and the stuff in it)… and following the bliss – naysayers be damned – is my true path now. And i can’t tell you how glad i am that i’ve found it, even if it seems to have taken forever.

So the journey has been long, but the destination isn’t yet here. I’ve been selling our stuff on ebay like mad, we’ve ditched our TV service (with the added benefit of confusing and annoying The Company and saving a lot of $), I’ve relearned the word “no” and we continue making good choices for ourselves – happy cows, sustainable building materials and being creative with what we’ve got and making what we don’t (if we must).

All this to say, with less stuff, you really can do (and be) more.

———-

* I can tell you with absolute certainty that there is a difference i can feel between meat from a happy cow versus an unhappy one (think the difference between open field and feed lot). i feel better after the meal, it’s easier to digest, and tastes completely different (read: better). My mom was skeptical but let me buy them a pound of “happy cow” (as it’s now come to be known in our houses, though i’d imagine that if the meat is in my procession at some point the cow was no longer happy). They kept it frozen for a while but finally cooked with it. Mom was astounded- she didn’t feel a heaviness and sloth that she usually does after eating beef and she noticed the difference later too as it didn’t make her stomach do flips during digestion. WIN!

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With the exception of the Volkswagen commercial (which is just damned adorable), i can’t stand car commercials (well, all commercials but car commercials tend to annoy me way more than usual). But this Toyota commercial is BRILLIANT.

We see a fairly – vapid isn’t the right word- girl sitting at her laptop with all her vintagey-feel items behind her on the bookshelf (which i bet were bought at Target instead of at a thrift store or passed down or handmade) talking about how her parents basically aren’t getting the modern idea of friends and socializing- clearly, since they only have 19 facebook friends and she’s got 687.

I love this commercial so much because it states REALLY CLEARLY a) what older adults think of us (us = the millennial’s, screenagers, etc) and b) what i think is all sorts of wrong with the world today (world = first world, obviously).

I hear conversations on the metro, in the grocery store and in the ether about facebook and, as the commercial puts it, “cute puppies” instead of – oh i don’t know – the debt ceiling, Oslo, what we can be doing about making the world a better, more awesome, safer, more educated, and equal place. Conversations are happening about things that didn’t happen in physical space and time and we’ve relabeled the not important, not urgent stuff as both urgent and important (okay yes technically, the internet is physical space and time, but you know what i’m trying to say, right?)

Okay, i know plenty of people (those i usually choose to associate myself with) who *are* discussing the big things and not just the “like omigod, he totally did this and then i said this and omigod how’s my hair” crap but i’m being harsh to illustrate a point. The commercial (to me) speaks of two issues: the fact that we (us youngin’s) have incorrectly redefined “socializing” and that we’re giving too much thought and time over to the crap that doesn’t matter. (*cough* Farmville *cough*).

Tell me if this sounds familiar to you:

You swipe open your device and look at it. It didn’t buzz, blink, or chirp but it calls to you. You check twitter, facebook, your email, tumblr, etc looking for new information – clearly in the intervening minute and a half since you put it down, something earth shattering must have happened? You flip through and tag an article to read later (not even now, when clearly you have nothing better to do), favorite someone’s witty tweet about their cat, and upload a photo you took last night of yourself at the computer. You go back and refresh twitter, fb, and your email. Nothing new. You pause because you’re not sure what to do with yourself now. (i have some suggestions).

If any of that sounded even remotely familiar  i suggest you put your device in a drawer and go for a walk. To maybe even pay attention to your to do list and start checking things off it.

We’ve let our devices and the technology define us instead of using the devices and technology to do what we do best, better.

The internet and other technologies could allow me to live in a box, devoid of sunlight, and order and pay for everything i needed – food? delivered. bills? paid. entertainment? enjoyed (maybe). But no where in there are other humans. The more i don’t interact with other people, the more i start to feel like i exist alone and the more self centered, self serving, etc i get – which leads to a lack of civility (why be nice when i’m the only one who matters?), increase in greed (it’s all about me), and increase in destructive actions (i’m above the law, i wont get caught, no one will know, etc).

Call me old school (or just plain old at the ripe old age of 28-again), but I think paying more attention to the physical will help us solve a lot of problems we’ve found ourselves in lately. Environmental issues relating to agriculture problems, feed lots, and the commercialization of the family table? Fixable when you start riding your bike to the farmers market and talking to the people who grow your food.

Now, i’m not saying the internet and our devices are bad (if it wasn’t for the internet, i’d be out of a job), i’m just saying we should use them to work for us, instead of letting them rule our lives. And for the love of Pete – to put them down every so often.

I recently had a conversation with my mother about communication – and when i mentioned how in the (actual) old days prior to answering machines (yes kids! machines!), when someone called and you weren’t home, you never knew! And you just weren’t available! My mom (strangely) came back with something along the lines of “but that’s not how it works today and when i call, i expect you to answer!” (i knew i shouldn’t have let them give me a cell phone to go to college with).

We talk of information overload (here, here, here, and here – to name a few… even though i just think it’s filter failure) and fail to realize that it’s quite simple to solve it – step away from the computer/tablet/smartphone/etc and go talk to some real, physical, face to face humans.

Perhaps it’s just that we (at least i do) work in a very in-your-head profession. We do lots of sitting, thinking, collaborating, reading, etc. It’s brain work. And at some point your brain needs something else.

In the last few months I’ve had almost a standing date with some friends to go see a movie (usually non-mainstream) and have dinner. It’s these interactions – the eating, the walking around town, the breathing in different air and seeing different sights that allows my brain the space to think differently.

I hear friends whining about their lives and then i see them tweet/post about how many episodes of Deadliest Catch they just finished watching. To quote the best poster ever, “If you don’t have enough time, stop watching tv.” Get out and go do something.

Okay so what’s my point? My point(s) are that we need to remember there are bigger things out there – that community (physical community too!) matters – and that the technology should be working FOR us, not the other way around.

On that note, i’m going to leave my computer, get on a plane, and go visit some humans for the weekend.

—-
here are the other commercials, clearly making fun of us, making fun of them: Missing Them, Messages, Commute, Cross-Country

possibly related posts:

1. a word on Geico commercials
2. thoughts on seeing clearly

The ocean and i have an interesting relationship – one that has resulted in more than a few bumps, bruises, and at least one near-death and while i signed up to do this partly to get over that (as well as blowing the envelope up), I was starting to get nervous as we got closer to Go Day.

The Experience
Michelle (the teacher, in the back of the photo on the left) and all the ladies i surfed with that weekend were very cool, fun and supportive when i surfaced as the clear winner of the Need Some More Handholding award.

Day one involved us learning to stand up in the white water (pictured*). We’d bring our board out to her, lay on it, and she’d push us into a wave and we’d pop up and ride it. Or as close as we could get to that. Riding the white water was a ton of fun for me and i even made it to my feet a few times (as proof by the photos i won’t be showing you), even though i wasn’t able to sustain it very long (will be working on that next time).

My big push was to make it out to the lineup. The lineup is the calm area our past the breaking waves where surfers wait to catch the next wave. To get to the lineup you paddle out. Easy-peasy. Except that sometimes to get past the waves you have to “Turn Turtle” to get past a bigger wave so that you don’t get worked (being held under by a wave, something i’m too familiar with) or so it doesn’t push you back closer to shore. Turning Turtle is when you grab the nose of your board with both hands, flip upside down and take yourself and the board underwater so the wave will shoot you out the back of it where you can then right yourself and keep going out to the lineup.

This is where, when i got stuck in my own head, i ran into problems. For me, being underwater in the ocean means something is wrong and my body goes into mild panic mode. I explained this to the teacher and she repeated that she wasn’t going to make anyone do anything they didn’t want to do, but that she wanted me to push myself and try it. Well of course, that’s what i was there for.

Luckily, when i started to paddle out to the lineup, there was a serious lull and the waves were small enough for me to lift the board on top of them or left myself up to let them wash between me and the board rather than having to go underneath them. Thank you Mother Nature.

Here’s me out in the lineup: i’m the first one on the left.

Man, i could have stayed out there all day. Just sitting out on the board, breathing in the salt air, feeling the breeze, feeling like i was floating (well, i was) and just basically loving it. And we were out there quite a while just enjoying it because we drifted waaay the hell down shore and had to paddle, against current, back to our spot. (This is where i came out above the rest of the group – apparently i’m an excellent paddler – lots of strength and stamina- whoo! i attribute that to all the years i spent swimming against the current to get back in front of of my umbrella instead of risking going to shore and walking it for fear of being pummeled by a breaking wave).

I probably would have loved sitting out in the lineup a little more if i hadn’t then got back into my head when i had to start thinking about getting back to shore (what do you mean i can’t just live here now?). The tide had started to come in and the waves were bigger (although, full disclosure: still barely anything). Truly, it wasn’t the crisis situation i was imagining, but i ended up paddling all the way back in – not once trying to actually catch a wave and stand up. Partly because i was worried i’d wipe out (yes, i know that’s part of the fun / the point) and partly because i really did enjoy laying on the board and riding the waves that way (i know that’s not real surfing. shush).

This is where i should have pushed a little harder on myself – and the reason why i will be taking classes again with her.

Lessons Learned
1. It’s always good to try something you’re scared of. Scared to the point of stomach turning, heart racing, palm sweating nervousness.

2. It’s sometimes hard to know where your comfort line is when you’re trying to push yourself a little past it. Meaning, more specifically, how far is too far to push yourself? How do you know since you can’t use how you feel to gauge it since how you feel is scared.

3. To surf you need balance. Not just on the board, but in your head and in life. You never want to take a chance to surf away from yourself so you eat and drink right so you have the energy and opportunity. You end up fine-tuning your intuition as you learn how you, the board, and the ocean work together. You learn patience (which i could use some of) and sharing when waiting in the lineup. You learn that while there’s basics – everyone has their own style of doing things that works for them and THAT’s OKAY!

4. It’s damn fun. (I mean look at that smile in the top photo!) There’s a reason there’s a surf camp whose tagline is “We make girls out of women.” We should be seeking more FUN in our lives. Get out from behind the screen, put down the latest inter-office memo and go have some fun. Remember what you loved to do as a kid? Go do it! (for me, that involves swings and twirling.)

I am definitely going to do this again. I love the water, and my relationship with the Ocean is slowly changing for the better and being able to harness the power of the wave for good instead of evil is an awesome proposition.

I encourage you to try surfing – or something else that seems completely outside your normal range. For me, i had to channel a little bit of a different side of myself to get there – and i LOVED her. :-)

If you’re anywhere near Ocean City, MD – or will be – here’s a plug for Sommers Surf Lessons.

—-

* I won’t be showing you the shot where i am actually standing up because i look ridiculous, haha). This one is either from when that’s as far as i made it during that try, or from when i squatted back down to avoid falling over when i actually did stand.

possibly related posts:

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I know i’m not alone in feeling that life can be a little unsatisfying. Why unsatisfying? We don’t know where we are, where we’re going, what it all means, etc, etc, etc. And maybe we look behind us for some inspiration and we see that the past holds pieces that feel more real, more amazing. More like the life we think we want. The great thinkers and artists, the inventions and ideas, the fights for freedom, change, and a new world. Maybe we feel that people aren’t fighting as hard, or contributing as much, or that we’re more lazy or more greedy or more stupid than our counterparts in the past. Maybe we just feel that we’ll “never be that good.”

But i now know why we think that. It’s a perception issue.

The problem is that we’re not done cooking. We do not know how history will paint us. It is only with the brushes of hindsight and the paints of time that we’re able to truly understand the world, how it worked, how it was intertwined, and the pieces and players that were instrumental in making it the age that it was.

It’s for those reasons that of course the present feels less satisfying than the past – the present is still unfolding in all it’s potential glory. The past has happened – we know the outcomes, the players- we know the whole story (well, kids in Texas might not). Humans tend to dislike stories where the ending is unknown (oh come on – movies that end in a “what” moment? they leave us feeling a little… unfinished)- which, is the case for all of us in the present. We don’t know what will happen. We plan, dream and work towards goals but in the end we have no idea what will come and how it will be. The present is both wonderful and terrifying for that reason.

In the past, we know who rises to greatness and stands the test of time! We know what decisions worked and which ones didn’t. We know which fights were won and at what cost. Who wouldn’t want to live in an era when we know where the pockets of greatness and wonderment are?

Maybe you wish you’d have been born earlier to have created alongside da Vinci during the High Renaissance or sit in the café’s in Paris with the now-classic writers in the twenties or been in Hollywood in the late sixties early seventies when the now-greats were getting their start. Every generation thinks the generation(s) before them were better, or nicer, or more gratifying in some way. As will the folks who come after us. And so on.

And that’s what’s so unsatisfying about the present – we. have. no. idea. It’s not all laid out. Most of us don’t know if those nights in the diner writing poetry on the back of placements will be lost to history or preserved. We don’t know if our story will stand the test of time, nor if it will work out how we hope.

In the movie Midnight in Paris (which i highly recommend you go see), this advice is given: “Don’t succumb to the despair. [It's your job to] find the antidote for the curse of existence. ” It’s our jobs as artists – the creators of things including our own destiny-  to not let the despair get in our way. To do the hard things, the things that we don’t know (and may never know in our lifetimes) if they’ll have the impression, impact, or outcomes we want them to.

The present is unsatisfying because life is a little unsatisfying but we should only take lessons and inspiration from the past, not the thought that it was better than now or that we will never live up to the ideals of the masters. The gift of now is that the story is unfinished. We get to finish it. More stories to start, and finish and start again.

We can not succumb to the despair that the greatness has already happened, that there is nothing new to be done. We have to slay our own demons, let go of what’s holding us back and run as fast as we can into the unknown with as much aplomb as we can and make life our bitch. (excuse me).

To that end, while slightly non-sequitor with my original point (sometimes i have them), i leave you with this message wrapped in a catchy little ditty from [title of show]:

You’re welcome. ;-)

possibly related posts:

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2. thoughts on seeing clearly

As of June 6th I am officially an adjunct professor for the University of Maryland ischool and i’m teaching “Information Access Services” in the fall.

(epic happy dance)

to be honest, if at any other point in my life you asked me if i wanted to teach i’d have said, “no” because that phrase “teaching” invoked an image of someone standing at the front of the class lecturing or imparting information to you. but when you reframe it as being the facilitator of learning, it’s a much less daunting proposition (at least for me).

guiding other people to find their way with a subject, helping light their fire (or help keep it lit), and having exchanges with people is what i love doing – and something i hope that i’m doing every day anyway.

and indeed, it was those rare teachers in my life that thought of teaching as a performance art (Mr. Howard, english) or let you follow your passion within the curricula (Madame Knobler, French; Professor Garcia, so many classes; Professor Radford, lib school) or encouraged you to learn in your own way and make up your own projects (Ms. Breslin, physics, Mrs. Deal, English) that really made the difference.

for me there is a direct correlation to the subjects i enjoy or am good at and the teachers that were more engaging.

I’ve trained people before, lead workshops, and even lead mini classes, but this is a new beast for me and if you’re a professor, I’d love to talk to you about things (leave comments or contact me!) but in the meantime, i’m very excited about being able to #hacklibschool from the inside.

As i tweeted today:

Someone said “if you’re doing it right, teaching is easy” meaning that if you’re facilitating ideas and discussion and being a guide to students rather than the all-knowing “sage on the stage” it’s a lot more fun, too!

And that’s exactly what i plan to do- we’ll see how that goes.

You learn the most when you’re encouraged to take control of their own learning – being able to follow the things that you love. Now, of course, i will have a syllabus with lesson plans but having that built in time to allow students to get out of the class what they wish to and letting them follow what lights their fire I think is the best way to have students be successful.

It’s like applying the 80/20 rule to school.

so, YAY I’M A PROFESSOR! i’m sure the nervousness will set in later, but for now, it’s pure glee.

if you’re in library school, talk to me about what you’d want to learn. If you’re a professor, talk to me about… everything! :-)

possibly related posts:

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2. 23 Things: Week 1, Thing 1 & 2 (an intro)

The concept of personal branding isn’t new- being able to market yourself and project a good image has been around since the dawn of civilization. What is new are the ways you can do it and the benefits and negatives that come with those different ways. Regardless of what technology you choose in your quest to learn, brand, and grow; remember that your personal brand is the reputation that proceeds you. For the purposes of this post, i’ll be focusing on the online stuff and leaving the work of being a good person/worker to you. :-)

Google yourself.

Searching is how people get a first (or second) impression about you these days. Knowing that fact of life, be aware of what comes up when you’re searched. Set up an RSS feed for yourself to keep track of mentions of your name, your email addresses, screen names, etc. I’ve got multiple google alerts set up for myself with varying forms of my name, handles, and keywords people might use to search me.

If you’re not online or have the awesome google fu that keeps you from being found, the absence of a presence isn’t detrimental. Unless, of course, you’re trying to get a job as an emerging technologies librarian or a community manager.

If you’re online, you want to know what comes up. Anything you wouldn’t want potential employers seeing? Facebook i think is the biggest offender in this capacity. Did a high school friend of yours suddenly start scanning and posting old photos of you? My apologies.

Update your facebook privacy settings and lock that mess down. I utilize a combination of friends lists and different privacy settings for each group to control what people see. My best friend can see, tag and post all. My coworkers can’t see photos i don’t post myself and won’t see wall posts i only post for friends. There’s nothing incriminating, but it’s part of my attempt to still keep two separate lives – my professional life and my personal life. In the old days (listen to me, haha) the only way a coworker would see pictures of me at a wedding would be if i brought the prints in to work. I like keeping those lines. Here’s the “10 Settings every Facebook user needs to know” from Mashable.

In the group tonight at UM, a student asked what happens if someone does post something bad about you. Good question. If it’s something like an old picture or post, ask them to take it down. If it’s someone disagreeing with your message, consider the source and/or speak to them about it; it might be an opportunity for an open conversation or rebuttal.

Know your goals.

It’s hard to figure out what to say and how to say it when you don’t know what you want your message to do for you. A successful personal brand is just one piece of the puzzle in the pursuit of one’s interests, contributions and networking. To start, you have to figure out who you are and who you want to be. This is the hardest part. What is your message? What are your goals? Where do you want to end up? You need to figure all these out before you can figure out what will get you there.

Don’t freak out, you don’t have to have your entire life figured out (which i believe is an impossible task, and don’t believe anyone who tells you otherwise). You just have to know what your current goal is. Do you want to be an academic librarian? Do you have a passion for transliteracy? What’s your goal? Whatever it is, it is from there that your message will come.

Create your toolkit.

How will you spread your message? Will you have a business card? Is Twitter your thing? Will you have a website to guide people to your tumblr, flickr, etc?

Whatever you do, make sure it fits what your goals are. Don’t use the technology for the sake of using the technology- make sure it is serving a purpose for you, helping you achieve your goals.

Whatever tools you choose, make sure your message and information are consistent. Have one avatar that you use- use the same screen name if you can (i use stnglibrarian and strangelibrarian for my professional things depending on how long the sn can be). Make sure your information is up to date; don’t be crossing out phone numbers on a business card- just get a different business card.

If you want to keep the different parts of your online life separate, use different sns or emails addresses. Right now i’m trying to figure out how to brand the artist part of me while still keeping it under the umbrella of “julie strange, awesome girl who does lots.”

Get out there.

There’s no point in creating a message and building your toolkit if you’re going to expect people to come to you. The technology is a tool to help you, it won’t do the work for you. Get out there and do the legwork. Go to meetings, conferences and groups. Introduce yourself and get your name out there. Who you should be talking to and networking with depends on where you want to end up.

Do the work.

Don’t forget to do the work. You build your personal brand every time you do a good job at work, help a coworker, solve a puzzle, etc. Your brand isn’t strictly what you say you are, it’s who you are. Building your brand online is your first or second impression. Being good at what you do is the lasting impression. But that’s a whole other post.

Those are the main points to get you started, but here are some other things i wanted to mention:

Ignore LinkedIn

When it tells you your “profile is only 80% complete! upload your resume,” just say no. I think it’s important to NOT post your entire resume online. Each resume should be tweaked and crafted to reflect the job you’re applying for. Having a standard, uncustomized resume out there for all to see isn’t putting your best foot forward. There’s nothing wrong with having your list of presentations, papers, classes, or even previous employers listed, but a full resume should be kept only for those to whom you are directing it.

Frequency matters, or not.

The frequency conversation can be a heated one. I say frequency doesn’t necessarily matter but it does depend on what your goals are. If you want to be known as an expert blogger on TopicA or its your goal to be paid for writing about TopicB, then frequent posts (of quality) are probably a good idea.

Make your own rules.

At the end of the day, you have to be comfortable with who you are, where you’re going and how you did it. Mix and match and find what works for you. Just remember to be consistent, keep things up to date as you change and morph your goals and use the tech to your advantage when you can. Oh, and have fun!

What ideas do you have about personal branding?

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Additional Reading:

• Five Ways To Not Screw Up Your Next Networking Attempt (Peter Shankman)
• How to Maintain Your Personal Brand as a Corporate Employee (Smashing Magazine)
• Keeping your personal brand organized: An interview with Dan Schawbel (Unclutterer)
• How to Monitor Your Personal Brand (For Free) (Librarian by Day, Bobbi Newman)
• Surprise – a Personal Brand is a By-product! (Library Hat, Bohyun Kim)
• Personal Branding for Public Librarians: Maintaining Your Brand (Spine Label, Julia Riley)

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For the crew, the journey started years ago but for me, it really got started last November. Discovery was set to launch on November 2nd and I had tickets. We went down to Florida to enjoy one of the last shuttle launches and it was postponed. and postponed. and postponed. First electrical issues then tanking issues. Finally, last Thursday, we gathered at the Visitor’s Center with a few thousand other people armed with blankets and chairs and sun screen to witness history. We watched the big screen as the crew got into the shuttle; listened as they did com checks and asked questions of Astronaut XX who was there on a stage telling us what space is like.

Launch is almost here. Go for launch checks starts and everyone is GO except for the RSO. No-Go citing “Display issues.” My breath catches in my chest and everyone around us goes quiet. Well, quieter… there were a lot of kids there who are rarely quiet.

The Range Safety Officer is the person who detonates the shuttle and rockets if something goes wrong during launch and they’re headed for a populated area. Not a job i’d want. ever.

They continue the countdown until the planned hold at 5 minutes to give the RSO additional time to fix the issue. When they announced the Go for Launch from the RSO, the crowd explodes into cheers. Discovery will finally launch.

With two seconds left in the launch window, the shuttle launches. The awe starts. I see the giant screen with the actual launch and a few seconds later it clears the trees and i see this:

it was more amazing than i expected. in fact, i’m in such awe i forget how to work my camera and end up not taking video when i think i am. but this person did:

as a matter of fact, that’s pretty much exactly what i saw. this video was shot by someone in front of me. which i know because when they pan around at the crowd, i catch a glimpse of myself wiping away tears.

i did capture some shots when Discovery was close to orbit. and so did other people.

Now back in Maryland, i find myself listening to NASA TV while i’m working. Today, watching the crew on their space walk fixing the ammonia tank and doing other things, they joked and enjoyed just like anyone does at work. Except for the fact that all of us were remaining still on a planet that seemed to zoom past them in view of their helmet cams. Best job ever.

I’m not going to tie this into anything library or tech related, i just wanted to share my experience with you. But I do hope that you’re able to experience something at least once that takes your breath away like this did for me. Life is made better by these moments of awe. In fact, i hope that every day takes your breath away.

Go for Launch.

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1. Privacy and recognition
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i woke up at about 10.30 this morning – far later than usual on a saturday. and because i’m addicted, i immediately grabbed for my phone to check email, twitter, the weather and Times. I didn’t make it to the Times.

10.30 is far late enough in the day for it to have warmed up but the weather was reading “19 degrees.” nineteen. that’s 51 degrees colder than i like. and about 13 degrees colder than sane. (there’s a reason i don’t live in Maine or out west, folks). I assumed it was an error (sometimes my phone will give me the cache from the last time i viewed a page) and refreshed it. Nope. 19 degrees.

in rebellion, i decided to change my breakfast plans of a whole grain waffle smeared with Skippy and vanilla yogurt with almonds to some other concoction. preferably tropical. i made pina colada pancakes and bbq corn muffins. and the verdict? “AWESOME!” according to the boy and myself. and so, i share my concoctions with you:

Pina Colada Pancakes

I had a package of Aunt Jemima pancake mix in the cupboard. Not the “just add water” kind (ick), the kind that you need milk, oil and an egg for.

to that i added:

• a half to a full cup or so of frozen pineapple (unfrozen and obliterated in my mini food processor/blender thing
• a few splashes of coconut extract (i just poured, but it was probably a good solid tablespoon+)

I was thinking of using coconut milk that i thought i still had in stock (i didn’t) but the general consensus afterwards that the pancakes were perfect as-is. i was also considering using pineapple juice instead of milk, but i’m glad i opted against that.

i’ve never made pancakes with things in it (blueberries, etc) so was slightly unprepared for the difficulty in flipping. eventually i got the hang of it and realized it was just because the pancakes were so damn moist (another raving comment from the peanut gallery was that they didn’t need to drown them in syrup like usual)

BBQ Corn Muffins

i think it was because i was reminiscing about a bbq pork and pineapple sandwich on coconut bread i had at the Polynesian Resort in Disney a few months ago but i thought BBQ corn muffins would go nicely with the pancakes (aside from the bread-overload).

i used the Jiffy mix and added bbq sauce to the mixture once it was all combined. probably 3 tablespoons worth? (can you tell i don’t measure?)

once poured into the muffin tin, i added a sprinkle of white cheddar cheese to the top of each. i really wanted to add a ton of cheese to the mixture itself but didn’t want to ruin it due to an insane cheese craving i’ve been having lately.

i had the muffins in the oven for the 15 mins while i was grillin’ up the pancakes. it all came out at the same time and smelled amazingly. the verdict? awesome too. but perhaps more bbq sauce and cheese next time. (i was so glad to hear that!)

So there you have it. an easy way to add a little tropical touch to your easily made standards. and i have to say, when served with some honey-glazed ham we had left over from Christmas, it was the perfect lazy (but frozen) Saturday breakfast.

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Exhibit #1: library catalogs and online booksellers

i used to wander around the bookstore (sorry, library) and look for covers that called out at me. it was a calming thing for me to do and i did it often when i needed to clear my head (with the added bonus of being able to find a book on something interesting in the process). i can’t tell you the last time i did that.

whatever the reason i stopped i get all my books through my library or from an online bookseller. Neither amazon’s or my library’s catalog of books allows me to truly browse the way i used to. serendipity  is gone. sure, sometimes i run across a book title i’m interested in somehow when someone mentions it on twitter or those amazon recommends things actually amount to 5 mins of clicking through finding interesting things, but those happy days of wandering through shelves of books and finding happy mistakes hidden between covers of glue and paper are gone.

perhaps it was just me but more often than not it was something about the physical representation of the item that called to me to investigate further. i found some of my favorite things that way. design always key. isn’t that the way of life? something about a scene calls you nearer on the street; something about a glance calls you closer to a new person.

Exhibit #2: the digital tv programming guide

remember the days when you could just use the channel up and down button to scroll quickly through the channels? channel surfing. Have you tried that lately? It takes a full few mili-seconds for the channel to change and load fully- for me anyway- and channel surfing has turned into scrolling through the program guide- which in turn makes me miss potentially interesting things. let’s face it – the names of some of these programs doesn’t always grab you. how much awesome stuff are we missing? i’m probably not talking about sitcoms but rather those documentaries that somehow always sound so boring or so off the mark that are truly fascinating.

Exhibit #3: your attention

what’s that? you can’t hear me over the tappity tap of your fingers on your universe-connected device? yeah. the world being pushed at us at lightning speed isn’t giving us more opportunities for serendipity. taking a breath now and then, putting down what we’re doing and either standing still or doing something completely different allows our brain to think in a different way and see new things… allowing serendipity to enter. I find that serendipity and other awesome things have a hard time getting your attention when you’re running around like a chicken in a rat race.

okay, bad image. but you get me, right?

what i’m doing about it

blackout sundays. one day a week where i literally unplug. we don’t hit the circuit breaker, but there’s a ban on all things that require electricity. no computer. no cell phone. no lights. sure, cooking is okay but we attempt the oven versus the micro (another lesson in patience, let me tell you). we light candles, play games, and have honest to goodness conversations with each other and ourselves. i might paint or write (by candle light), or we might leave the house all together (what a concept)- giving myself that time to just exist in the world gives my brain time to flag me down and make me notice all those things i missed throughout the week when i still find myself on auto-pilot.

i’m still working on the book thing.

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Update: Hey look! This post got picked up by American Libraries Direct, January 19th edition:

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