The second Zoom was a success in every way, at least for me and hopefully for others.

I think it was one of the best ideas I’ve ever had.  It’s a great beginning.

The people on this Zoom were a perfect geographic, cultural, thoughtful, and interesting mix, only the Internet can offer that.

Half were from California and got up early to join the meeting, the other half were from all over the place. They were all nice and interesting people.

Like me, they are eager to find communities online where they can talk free of second-guessing, criticism,  argument and hostility. I found that two members lived just up the road from each other in California and didn’t know it until they learned they were both log readers.

One of them lost her home in the Paradise fire, and the two meet regularly.

They are both ukelele players and meet regularly to play. I urged them to play the ukelele for us during one of our meetings. They agreed. A third person chimed in, she plays the ukelele too. I feel a concert coming on.

Several people emailed me to say they were shocked to see and hear me and learn what I am really like. You can only see so much in blog posts and e-mail, it’s easy to misunderstand and miscommunicate.

It was valuable, it was fun. Everybody got to speak. We like each other. I learned a lot. We talked about the hostility tearing the country in pieces, the epidemic rudeness, aging, retirement, teaching and choices.

Ron, a minister and Vietnam Vet from Ohio, came on; it was a joy to see him.

Bob may be a brother from another mother (we even use the same Sleep Apnea masks and are both diabetics with some heart issues) and an IT specialist from Minnesota. Bob lives on Jack London’s houseboat just outside of San Francisco.

I closed the group at 7, and about 15 people didn’t get in. The group was terrific, I’ll make sure to keep letting in some new people, but this group is coalescing beautifully.

It’s something I need, and I think many of us need and hope it can work as a model for a new kind of online communications, which are missing now in the tidal wave of texts, blog comments and e-mails. We seek to talk to other humans, not argue or judge them.

We can use these new tools for good, not just for conspiracy theories and keep our humanity.

The next meeting will be  held on Wednesday, September 28 at 20 a.m.

How To Join The Next Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87822862552?pwd=V2U0SnNyejFJZlNNazZ1d3RLVUFSQT09

Meeting ID: 878 2286 2552
Passcode: 712821

So thanks to those of you who came to talk with me. We got all the bugs ironed out and we could hear and speak to one another.