Ghost of Midnight

Civility Online? Yes!

So much online space is whacked… strange people doing strange things… wonder around MySpace and soak it up.  Even the relatively mainstream sites often sound shrill… spend an hour reading the comments section of some of the political blogs out there.  Then there’s the manufactured hipness of most commercial sites.

So what’s a grown up to do? Many in our beta city are finding Front Porch Forum and breathing a sigh of relief.  With participation in each neighborhood forum limited to nearby residents (within a few hundred households) and each message automatically labeled with name and address, people know to be on their best behavior.  An exchange this week in one of our urban forums demonstrates…

A local real estate agent asked “why do we tolerate the theft of shopping carts by people who use them to collect refundable bottles and cans out of our recycling bins?”  A few replies to the neighborhood forum built a rejoinder around “hey, give these folks a break; we should be helping them out not making them out to be criminals.”

At this point, in other online venues, one could almost hear folks gassing up their flame throwers, preparing for the inevitable nasty exchange.  Not here.  The real estate agent responded civilly and expanded on his original point… “why is it okay to steal shopping carts?  We’d have a different reaction if these folks were stealing cars to collect bottles and cans, or your kid’s little red wagon.”

Now, when these previously-unknown-to-each-other neighbors meet while walking their dogs or shoveling snow (if it ever returns!), they’ll hopefully be able to continue this mostly civil and constructive discussion, or launch a new one… building community with those living nearby.  Neighborhood!

Neighbors Rally for Sick Toddler

I studied engineering in school and therefore never had time for Philosophy 101, so grant me license to roam occasionally…

As most of us chug through our stress-filled days focused on the next several “to do”s on the list, tragedy hangs nearby, waiting to pay a visit. The oncoming car crossing the centerline, the phone call in the middle of the middle of the night. Sometimes, thankfully, it retreats before doing its worst, like the story below from one of our neighborhood forums in Burlington yesterday:

Thank you to all our new friends on Scarff Ave for their concern for our 15-month-old son who suffered a very high fever over the weekend. He is recovering, but still under the weather. We took him to the hospital on Sunday night after his fever spiked from 101.3 to a whopping 106.7 in just over an hour. After numerous tests the Drs could not pinpoint a source of the fever – no infections – but did discover that he was severly dehydrated. We had been giving him plenty of water and a little fruit juice… The important thing is to drink the right kinds of fluids – namely Pedialyte or another electrolyte drink (not Gatorade). Our son is still running a low-grade fever and today broke out in a rash, which we were told to expect. He is being closely monitored, but for now the source of his incredibly high fever remains a mystery.

I wanted to share our experience to help other parents whose little ones might go through the same thing. Thanks again for all of the well wishes.

As a father of similar-age kids… wow. My heart goes out to this young family. And what a wonderful response from these parents… to be able to turn to new neighbors for support, and then, with their little trooper still showing symptoms, to share their story as a lesson so that others may avoid the same hardship. That’s great.