Monday, January 2, 2012

What I Learned About Social Media From My Grandmother

It was warm, sunny, and blue skies today as I piled my 2yr. old daughter into her Chariot (a bike trailer but with skis) and began nordic skiing up the trail.  Usually being outdoors with my daughter in good weather buoys my spirits in a rush of fresh air and endorphin fueled euphoria; however today my thoughts drifted to work and the coming challenges of second semester.  As I considered the 2 research projects I will conduct before concluding my masters degree, a second round of technology grants to facilitate, numerous details to work out for our fledgling online ed. program, and an uncertain job situation for 12-13 (I chose to scale back to part time the last two year as I complete my masters) I began to feel some feelings of stress creeping into my otherwise idyllic outing.  To overcome this I thought back on many of the inspiring blog posts I have read over the past two weeks, which helped. And as I reflected, another source of inspiration came to me.

This Christmas I went with my wife and daughter for our annual visit to my Grandmother who lives in Florida.  I have always been close with my grandparents and consider them to be a very positive influence in my life.  While I was there my grandmother asked me to read her story.  I knew she had been working on it since my grandfather passed away 2 years ago and that she had spent a great deal of time on it.  Reading it was very emotional for me as it first told of her and my grandfather’s early life together and then detailed the struggles they experienced as my grandmother cared for and watched my grandfather fade away over 8 years as he battled with Lewy Body Dementia (similar to Alzheimer's) which robbed him of his memory and finally his ability to take care of himself.   

Gram asked me what I thought about the book and what changes I would recommend.  After I got over my initial emotional response, I asked her who her audience was.  She responded that she had written the story to share with others so that they could learn from her experience and avoid some of the negative experiences that had made a difficult experience even worse.

While I didn’t realize it in Florida, skiing up the trail today I thought more about what it had taken my 82 year old grandmother to complete her story, the document was over 45 pages long, and what that implied about the strength of her motivation. My grandmother had polio as a child which left her with only partial use of her left hand.  In addition, she has arthritis. She also has deteriorating vision.  She typed the entire thing on a Windows laptop that my family bought her 2 years ago so we could Skype and email her.  Prior to owning that laptop, she had never owned a computer in her life and to my knowledge has never done much typing (she prefers writing letters by hand).

Thinking about what she had done, I realized two things. The first of course is that my challenges, while not trivial, are certainly no greater than those of others and in many respects pale in comparison.  The second was the power of human desire to share experiences and the potential for society to benefit from this sharing.  Gram’s experience with my grandfather was truly terrible, however she believed that by sharing it others could benefit.  I think this really gets to the heart of what social media can offer. I have found that interacting with others on Twitter and the Blogosphere to be a great source of inspiration, validation, and knowledge.  I believe that part of human nature is to share our experiences, whether positive or negative, so that others may benefit.  

As I stood in the sunshine on top of the mountain, considering the potential of technology supported knowledge sharing to positively impact our schools, and our world, it was enough to wash away my concerns about the coming semester and reignite my passion for overcoming the challenges on the horizon. 

1 comment:

  1. Social media is also a great way to keep in touch with old friends...and ones that live far far away...and remind them exactly why you became friends in the first place :-)

    That being said, this post is very touching and I really like your insight "I have found that interacting with others on Twitter and the Blogosphere to be a great source of inspiration, validation, and knowledge. I believe that part of human nature is to share our experiences, whether positive or negative, so that others may benefit." And I think that it's a shame these social media tools are often abused and misguided and used to take advantage or even hurt others. I know this blog post is for me, and hopefully for others, a gentle reminder of what it's really all about.

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