400 Blips

Delta of Age

The more I pick up, the more I let go.
The wider my banks, the more sluggish I flow.
With silt from the mountains and the city's debris,
The slower the river, the nearer the sea.

--Naomi Replansky.

When my 100th blip came, I was completely surprised. I didn't know what it meant or why I got the notification after I'd posted. Then when my 300th blip came, I was again completely surprised. By then I had seen people post interesting 300 blips, counting things, laying things out, making an occasion of it. But I had not been counting; I was all caught up in trying to change the world. When my 365th blip came, I was in Hawaii as a guest of my son, and completely out of everything. Certainly I was not counting my blips. Surprised again.

But yesterday, someone requested that I delete a blip she was in. She hated the picture and didn't want it to be on the internet for others to see. So of course I deleted it. Then the museum blip became my 399th blip. Arachne reached her 300th today and cleverly went out counting panes of glass and doing fancy math. So I decided to have a little party for my 400th blip, along with a Naomi Replansky poem about aging (she knows, being in her 90s now). Here are 880 leaves, more or less, representing the 880 blips I would have posted if I hadn't left gaps or gone back and deleted ones I felt were boring and ones that people asked me to delete.

Happy 400th Blip day to me. I am still here, more or less. On good days. I love looking at people's pictures and reading their journals. Why should this be? I only know that it is so. I am endlessly curious about people's lives, I love to see what other people see and think about. I'm enjoying the ride, gaps and all. My all-time favorite of mine is this one. I have favorited 737, and I love every one of those and a lot more. I think three hearts a day is way too little.

P.S. For those of you following the Alicia Jackson story, this message came today at 10:30 a.m.: "All of the public and private sources we are monitoring are confirming that we have a reprieve in Alicia's battle against the city. As a result, we are going to shift strategies and reduce the focus and presence at Alicia's house. This means we won't need people camping here any longer. We are going to continue to maintain a reduced presence at the house and of course we will utilize the rapid response network if needed."