The possibility of violent death – my own or that of a loved one – has been a part of my consciousness for as long as I can remember. My dad was in Vietnam during the war. He was there as a civilian, but was nonetheless a target. I was young and understood next to nothing about any of it, except that my daddy could be killed.
I have long said that, if more people could attend Woodstock School, there would be fewer wars in the world. (The photo above, of some of my graduating class at a reunion in 2016, may give you a clue why.)
The school is now offering Scholarships for Peace. “So far recipients of the Scholarships for Peace programme have come from countries including Syria and Afghanistan, but Woodstock welcomes applications from students from any regions which are affected by war, violence and oppressive or fragile regimes.”
If you can help us find students who qualify and would be likely to thrive in an English-language learning environment, please get in touch with the school, details here.
T-shirt available from the Female Collective (with proceeds to the original artists of the meme – not a ripoff of the original work, as so often happens!)
It’s both the blessing and the curse of tech that there is always something new to learn, invent, and do. Some technologies require years of study and practice to become truly skilled at, and it can seem as if, the minute you finally reach a pinnacle of achievement with Technology X, along comes Technology Y – and everyone is excited to switch to it.
It’s a painful reckoning. The technology that you loved, worked hard at, possibly helped to create, is being eclipsed. All that you have invested in it – blood, sweat, brains, tears, and time – now feels like wasted effort. What should you do?
Continue reading Letting Go of a Beloved TechnologyThis was our second trip to Australia – we went three Christmases in a row. The tickets had been paid for before we realized I had breast cancer, and, as it turned out, the trip was an important respite between surgery and chemotherapy.
I only learned for sure that I would have to have chemo the day we landed in Sydney. Knowing that we would be returning to months of hellish treatment, we decided to have as much fun as we could during our vacation!
Continue reading Australia 2014-2015
