We the people sailed through the streets ferried along by each other’s joy, hope, relief, disbelief, and a freezing wind.

We were the people of whom Alexander spoke, and this day we became the floating, sailing people. We floated together: children, elderly, new parents and letting-go boomers. We floated together as the rainbow of colors and cultures, and as the working poor and the working better-off.

We sailed past pleasant MPs and festive volunteer ambassadors, past entertainers and past people with causes. We gathered up the shirts and hats from grateful vendors, and we sailed on to the gleaming monuments to our freedom.

And when we reached the sounds of our young leader’s words, we the people stood together feet still not grounded, levitated by the great joy, great energy, great hope. The tears flowed down our frozen cheeks, and we the people said yes we will; we will rebuild, and we will sail on.

Toilet Stall Diatribe

Ok, so here you are in the train station or the airport with your roller bag and your tote, and of course you should go to the bathroom to try to avoid the contest of peeing while the train or plane jostles you around, and you are swaying to and fro or shoved around by  sudden jolts, and you are trying desperately to keep your pants dry. (Yes, I am talking about women, and I will expound on this in another blog.)

Into the restroom you go, and here is the point of this blog: Why oh why oh why do they make toilet stall doors open inward?? I would much rather watch that I don’t get smacked in the head by an opening door than go through the trauma that awaits me. The stall is too damn small, and the door opens inward! You pull your suitcase in and wedge yourself into the wall so that you can lift the suitcase over to the other side. The toilet is a precarious ½ inch from you and just teeming with germs, bacteria and viruses and horrible things that you will never recover from if you touch it with any part of your body. You inch the suitcase over; you inch yourself over; you finally manage to clear the door so you can shut it. Aaii! The evil toilet is looming! What happens next is for a future blog, but rest assured the whole process must be repeated to flee the murderous toilet cell, but at least at this point you don’t have to hold it in as well as inching and lifting and sliding and pushing and pulling and, of course, swearing.

I am so traumatized by this state of affairs that I often have dreams of searching for a bathroom and finally I find a huge, stadium type restroom with scores of stalls, but….when I open the stall door and try to get in, there is no way I can get past the door to reach the toilet of my nirvana.

Public restroom designers, arise! Take your place as the savior of humanity! I beseech you - insist that your doors open outward!

Greetings Blogosphere!

This new blog is Aging Boomer Chick Diatribes. The blog will be about all kinds of things – whatever strikes me, or strikes you. In my opinion, the important thing is to have an opinion...and to have a sense of humor about it.

Gather 'Round the 21st Century Front Porch

Viral marketing and online community building is very interesting to me. It is fascinating that younger generations form communities through technology; it's kind of "back to the future". Their front porches are their text messages and twitters.
 
Although our generation keeps up with friends and family the best we can, I think we lost a real community sense because we are all so busy working and doing "our own thing". Maybe younger people missed the old-fashioned community in some way and now form it through technology. Temporary communities like "meet-ups" show the importance of community to them for fun and for accomplishing a mission. They just seem to be a more connected generation than boomers, and maybe we should learn from them.
 
So please think about this blog as a big front porch where we are all sitting around shooting the bull. And guys, grab a seat on the porch. I have “chick” in the title just for alphabetical suitability.

Just so you know where I am coming from:

About Abby Cedee (pronounced as in French – "See-day") Do you get it? This is my pen name. It derives from my blog name.