The summer of 40 and 100.

This was the summer of my 40th birthday and my great-aunt's 100th. Her birthday was July 2, which was a great way to reclaim that date. There was a big family reunion the week before her birthday, so I went down to where she and her children live, and my parents came up. More family met up there, then we all drove out to the middle-of-no-where West Virginia, to a camp resort where even more family people I'd never met before converged. Most were from the side of my great-aunt's late husband's family, and I didn't know them since I am from my great-aunt's side. (My grandfather was her brother.) It was great to meet and get to know the extended family.

While I was down there, before we went to the camp in no-cell-phone-reception-West-Virginia, I introduced them to my boyfriend via the magic of the Internet. We had hoped he would be able to come on the trip, but he had to work, so we did the next best thing. My second cousins were eager to meet him, and I wanted him to meet them all. As I sat down with my great-aunt and was in the process of connecting to my boyfriend using Google Chat video, I glanced over to my right and saw a stereoscope casually sitting on the table beside me. I thought about how much change my almost-centenarian great-aunt has seen in her lifetime as I watched her video chat with my boyfriend.

Well, I'm still here.

Hello! It's been a while. Nothing dramatic has been going on here; it's just been cold and wintry and I guess I have been hibernating a bit. Or maybe it's that I blog so much for work? Who knows. Or quite possibly, it could be the impending deadline of a big project I'm working on. Which reminds me...I should probably be working on that now.

Anyhow, before I go back to that project, I wanted to share some links of a number of interesting articles I've recently read that address societal changes in regards to marriage, singlehood, and concepts of community. Enjoy!

• The Atlantic's All The Single Ladies
• The New York Times' The M.R.S. And the Ph.D.
• The New York Times' One's A Crowd
• The New York Times' Alone Again, Naturally
• The New York Times' Room for Debate: Being Alone Together
  

Why haven't I heard about this before now?*

So this short** video and this one moved me. A lot. And made me think. A day after I first saw these videos, I am still feeling this way.*** Check them out and then come back and let me know what you think.

PPS. Here is an article on girleffect.The videos are design genius. This article talks about why they are so effective.

*This article is where I heard about it.
**As in, only about 2 minutes.
***I have been thinking about the power of one person, and specifically the power of one woman and the effect one individual can have on the world. I mean, impacting ONE person's life IS do-able. Working towards human right and social change on a international scale is a huge, overwhelming task, often slowed down by systems and large organizations. But helping one person so that one person's life is changed? Yeah, that is do-able. And if lots of people help different individuals? Well....then maybe some lasting positive change would occur in the world.