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WE are the Cloud: The Best Way to Preserve Your Memories Forever

Lately I’ve noticed and read a few articles about the danger of the digital life — the fact that so much of our lives is stored on random servers or auto-deleting email Inboxes. This recent NPR article about a “digital will” comes to mind. Similarly, this Wall Street Journal article makes the case for an “analog” life and how sometimes what’s digital isn’t...

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Remembering a Life Well Lived

I had the unfortunate privilege Saturday of attending the life celebration of the father of a dear friend. The nature of his life wasn’t particularly extravagant or exciting; he had a career in health care for about 30 years, and lived in the same modest but very nice home as long as I knew him. His Midwest background, love of baseball, and joy in his children and grandchildren made him, to me,...

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Green Bananas in Your Garage: Why Now is the Time To Sell Your Old Books

A few years ago, I was talking to an older colleague to see how he was doing — he had experienced some health problems in the last few years. His response was: “Well, let’s just say I don’t buy green bananas anymore.” The man had a great, if somewhat dark, sense of humor. I’ve since thought about “green bananas” in a lot of different contexts. It comes to...

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Technology’s Good Side

For the most part (my apologies to indigenous tribes of the Amazon that may have happened upon my blog), we are a Wired World. There’s an amusing video circulating these days showing Bryant Gumbel and Katie Couric struggling with the beginnings of the Internet Age in 1994, and it only serves to illustrate how far this medium has come in the lifetime of a high school senior. There are obvious goods...

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Get Rich Quick! Give More of the Right Kind of Gifts

“The gift is to the giver, and comes back most to him–it cannot fail.” – Walt Whitman I’ve been re-listening to my audio book of Seth Godin’s “Linchpin,” and something struck me differently this time. In the book he talks about the idea around potlatch, a ceremony among the native tribes in the Pacific Northwest of giving gifts. The key principle of the...

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Making 2010 Memorable – A Year in Pictures Made Easy(ish)

I’m a sucker for “End Of/Best Of” slideshows – always have been. You know what I’m talking about… the look back on a year of school, a great road trip with friends, or even the ESPN “Best of the Year” year-end montage of the best sports highlights of the year. So one of the first things I thought of making to start a great personal history in 2011 was just a “Best of 2010” slideshow,...

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Majoring in My Own History

“God made man because He loves stories.” – Elie Wiesel I’m starting this blog because I resolved to fix a problem this year: much like a warehouse full of 2010 puppy calendars, I have TOO MUCH of the WRONG THINGS. I HAVE plenty of photos, yearbooks, class notes, and various other memorabilia taking up space in my garage. I NEED memories, stories, emotion, journeys, triumphs, lessons, and legacies...