Why Not Rachel » community

Making Yourself Relevant, A Story

Rachel — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 16:24:37 +0000

Up until a couple of years ago, the street I live on had its own Mayor. George, Major of Harwood St. The only major scandal during his tenure was the discovery that he had been feeding our dog an egg McMuffin, EVERY DAY.

My husband and I live on a Live Oak lined, brick paved street where neighbors know one other in no small part because of what George brought to our ‘hood.

There are still conversations about George as neighbor greets neighbor taking in our own recycle bins. “If George were here our bins would have already been back at the side of my houses” we say. Even a couple years after his passing we are still saying, “that truck would not be parked there If the Major were around. Anne wouldn’t have to find someone to collect her mail while she’s gone, and that cat would have already been fed if George were here.”

We all still miss him and feel his absence. The 90 something year old man form Skenektady,NY who moved to Harwood St. and made himself, kept himself, relevant. Most mornings I would spot George peddling past our house ridding his three wheeler on his way up to the closest McDonald’s. About a mile and half round trip. The rest of the day would be dappled with George sightings and sounds that indicated he was around and doing his thing.

Major George’s General Job Description:
Know everyones business
Take in everyone’s recycling bins
Sweep walk ways
rake leaves
take in mail
turn on front porch lights
Bring around trash cans
feed stray animals
Get cars towed
Keep an eye out for everyone!

Once when Matthew was out of town I had walked up to the market for a few items. George, of course saw me as I passed by his house so stepped outside to ask “where you going missy?”
“To the store George, do need anything?” He says he’s fine and I walk on.
He of course knows that my husband is out of town, cause, well, he knows everything. I’m pretty sure that he keeps a closer eye on me than most because of my white cane.

At the market I turn to see a disheveled old man. He doesn’t look at me, just says to himself, “there she is”. I smile at George even though he still has not looked at me. He leaves the store.

I finish my shopping, and of course, right outside I see George. He’s standing by his three wheeler and without a word he grabbing my bags, (looks around in them a little) and then settles them into the basket. “You took the long way” he says to me, “I’ll show you the short cut home” that’s all he says as we head back to Harwood St.

The Major got payed with lots of gratitude, conversation (when HE was in the mood) leftovers and baked goods. He got rides when he needed them. He was thrown an annual bowling parties for his birthday and he was loved.

George made his life relevant!!!

Governor David Paterson: A Perspective Check

Rachel — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 13:43:01 +0000

Today’s thoughts on “Living Without Limitations” is all about a perspective check:

Did you catch last weekends Saturday Night Live’s skit spoofing Gov. David Paterson of New York State? If you didn’t see it, maybe you have been hearing all the noise that has followed in its wake.

My take is that this is good news for people with disabilities. Think about it, a blind guy is Governor of New York State …An”openly blind” guy…Governor of NY! Plus, the guy has enough cache to merit a skit on SNL. Well, we have arrived!

It’s easy to forget the fact that we have already had a disabled person in high office. Then however every effort was made to hide the fact that the President of the United States of America, FDR, could hardly walk. Somehow a disability showed weakness, so it was painstakingly hidden. Today the disability of a public servant is not hidden. We have come so far in fact, that it’s acceptable fodder for a comedy skit. Or, it should be acceptable fodder, but we still have some raw nerves it seems. Too bad.

My only beef with the skit is that it just wasn’t that funny. Funny would have been if the Governor showed up and spoofed himself.

It’s too bad that Paterson jumped right into “outrage” before consider the situation from many angles. The same goes for The Federation for the Blind and other disability advocacy organizations. We had the chance to say, it’s great that we are at a place that it’s alright to poke fun at someone specific who has a disability. His character was not being attacked, his accomplishment as a guy in the public eye was being exploited. Haven’t we been aiming for equal access? He wasn’t selling pencils on street corners in New York City, we was holding a graph on the economy upside down. It wasn’t super funny but it was not degrading.

Take the risk and express your HONEST thoughts on this. I would love to hear what you have to say.

What Does “Landing Butter Side Up” Mean to you?

Rachel — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:58:14 +0000

Here are some of the answers I’ve gotten from asking this question on twitter.

What does “landing butter side up mean to you”?

LdyDisney: Landing butter side up means that nothing bad stuck to you right? You fell but no harm done…

mikecane: I wouldn’t even eat toast that fell butter side up. But the colloquial meaning is to survive a fall with the least damage.

wharriman: maybe what looked like a sure disaster didn’t turn out so bad after all…or else you just dropped your bread..

steveofmaine: If you’re falling into a situation as it were, to position yourself as best you can to make the best of it?

incslinger: means you have cheap carpet

(I didn’t fully understand this so I asked for some elaboration…)

Yep, thats what my Mum used to say. If you had expensive carpet it would have landed butter side down - Sod’s law lol

DeenaEsq: To me, I’d have to go with “Yea! 5 second rule applies!” (Don’t tell my kids I said that though…LOL) (just don’t let them read my blog Deena)

NikiSherman: butter side up to me means that whatever happens in my life, something good is made from it

NextInstinct: “Landing butter side up” ? It means 5 second rule is in full effect! Enjoy the toast! {It means fall up

UrbanPanther:landing butter side up to me means that I was lucky because I didn’t end up with a sticky mess.Haven’t heard that in awhile!

rebeccashapiro: The toast flips and luckily lands butter side up avoiding a slippery floor

smlacy: “Oh good! My bread didn’t get cat fur all stuck in the butter! Alriiight. Lucky todayy.”

ReikiMoon: butter up? you can dust off & keep going, butter down, you’re screwed..ain’t no pickin’ dirt outta butter!

Welcome

Rachel — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 05:24:00 +0000

Welcome to my new Weblog site, I am giddy to have it up and running. It is a “site” to behold, let’s take a tour. No wait, I have a boat load of thanking to do first. If you don’t know the following people allow me to introduce them.

Barbara Sher, NY Times Bestselling Author and my mentor, tasked me to learn to do this Weblog. I have been fighting her suggestion to do a website for nearly a year. Then on Twitter I met Chris Brogan who is only a social media super star and a very generous man ta boot. Chris said “don’t do a website, that’s so web 1.0 do a Weblog instead.” I said o.k. and he pointed me in the direction of Andy of Bloghost.me and Tubu Domains fame.

Andy: instrumental in not only helping me jump threw the hosting hoops for THIS site but is helping me do a part of the documentation for http://hostyourblogsite.wordpress.com. Which is going to be a step-by-step “how to host your own wordpress blogsite” written in a tech free language. Go ahead and visit the site but it’s not completely ready yet. Geeks, I’ve learned, are not bilingual when it comes to this stuff.

Other wonderful creative geek types are also playing a role in getting that other site clear and helpful. Anyone who ends up using the hostyourblogsite will owe a thanks to Kenny Hyder. I have been grilling poor Kenny. I have been TRYING to teach him our language as he explaining the many fascinating computer things. He struggling…they all do.

Then the heavens dropped David Henderson into my laptop. You may know him as the Emmy award winning former CBS News Correspondent. I knew him first as the really nice guy who offered to help me get this site up and running. A more generous fella I have not met. You can see I’m modeling (alright, copying) my site’s look from David’s own.

Then there’s fun to come too. My friend Paisano and I are going to make my blog talk. Yep. Accessable baby! Each post will have text to speech capabilities. Can I “hear’ a wooohooo? Paisano will be using my site in a blog post as an example after we install this cool feature. It will be on http://mashable.com Where he has a column http://mashable.com/author/doriano-carta

There’s just a few of the many hands, heads and hearts that have come together to help me create this site. I hope this new Weblog proves to be the place to come to get the know-how and support to take the risks necessary to live a limit free life. It’s not easy to live your best self, but it’s sure the hell worth it. And we don’t do it alone. This site is a great example of that principal isn’t it?

So look around. I especially like the moving topic cloud, bottom right. Please subscribe and enjoy.

All my best,

Rachel

At the Twitter Cafe’

Rachel — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 23:39:46 +0000

If you have been thinking about signing up to use Twitter, here are a few things that might help you both use it and feel more comfortable with it. I write this from a non computer, non social networking, don’t know what the letters PR stands for kind of perspective.

I think it was Jonathan Fields who said that Twitter is like the water cooler at the office. I think it’s even cooler (so to speak) than that. And something many of us are also likely to be comfortable with.

I am seeing it more like a really hopping cafeteria at a huge high rise office complex. So not only are there people that are not in our “department” having lunch at this ”Twitter Cafe” there are tons of people that are from other offices all together.

So what we are doing in Twitter is building acquaintances. We come into the Twitter Cafe and ask if we can set your trays down with an interesting group of neck tie types. Or we go sit with those cute blue-jean, Google-like geeks over at the table by the window.

So I think it’s not right to think of Twitter as JUST a marketing tool, even though it clearly is a wonderful marketing tool. To think of it in JUST that way l feel is using people, and that’s just not my style and hope not yours either. I think we are building all kinds acquaintances as I said before and maybe even some friends, at least familiar faces.

Which brings up faces. Have one! Have at least an icon that is the symbol of you. Otherwise it’s like going down for lunch and saying, “no one talk to me.” You want people to say, “oh there’s that crazy lady with the red shoes who takes her little dog everywhere!” So put an image up for your Twitter self.

I come down to the “Twitter Cafe” now and then whenever I’m working on the computer and see if there’s anyone there or any conversation I want to add something to. It’s just not promo. I am not totally keen on the idea of just coming down for lunch and say LOOK WHAT I DID AT MY DESK TODAY! I think…”who are you???” The only exception to this rule is the fat and sassy like dudes named Seth who can have everyone follow him and no one he follows..seems a little Messiah Complex to me. I’m just saying… But hey, if you have something really interesting to say, “say it and they will follow.”

So we are social people who like people, sit down at the Twitter Cafe now and then, and say hi. For people who work primarily for or by themselves, this is an especially great place for us.

The other thing I want to say is about following and being followed. That’s just like who you notice in the cafe and who’s noticed you sort of. The guy that’s following like 8,000,000 people and is followed by like 2 people, I don’t trust. I think Parana. If someone like that follows me, I usually say no thanks.

If you don’t know what I mean by follow and following ask me and I can explain it more clearly than I’ll do right now.

So I’ve noticed the most interesting and “popular” people in the Twitter Cafe are those that have about an equal numbers of followers and followings. So, okay, yes, I wanta be popular. But I’m not going to go around shaking hands with everyone at lunch all at once that makes me the scary person. The parana I mentioned above.

I’ve been trying to follow 1 or 2 new people every day. When I do this, I’m seeing that more often than not, they tend to follow me too. If they post too much or we just don’t click, I will un-follow them.

So if someone seems interesting enough to sit at the same table with your cup of coffee, go ahead and follow them. You don’t even have to talk to them. By following you’re just catching each others eyes and tipping your head at them in a friendly hi. That’s it. They are likely to smile back.

So as you get to know the faces of the people that work in your office building and know a little bit about them, you can share a little bit about yourself. There are likely to be some people at your table who do want to hear about what you wrote about this morning. Or they might want their co-worker to hear about what you wrote about this morning. So see now you are really a part of a social network.

I’ll see you at the Twitter Cafe. I’ll be coming down soon to strech my legs and grab a bite. Click HERE to follow me.