Tookie

Tookie started blipping in 2009, and I started in 2010, so we are both long-term (but not every day) members of this community. Today Tookie joined Sue and me for a morning in Sue’s garden, and in this photo, Tookie is holding a couple of CDs sent to her by meles who mailed them to me first so I could also enjoy them before passing them on. 

Sue and I met Tookie in person in 2018, and now we live in the same town. Three introverts in a garden, talking about Blip friendships. It’s an odd business, “following” the lives of people we’ve never met. We age together and witness turning points—love, death, marriage, divorce, retirement, birth, illness, accidents, achievements. But we also witness boredom, brain-fog and plenty of humdrum—what shall I Blip today? Gifts: actual gifts mailed across oceans, like these CDs, but also gifts of encouragement, appreciation, recognition, empathy. Interconnection. I see you. I hear you. Me too.

We differ or agree. We nourish. We offer book recommendations, films to see or avoid, photographs of places and people we will never see except in photographs. We learn about fungi, cheese-making, dog-training, cancer treatment, neurodivergence, dementia, and of course photography. Commenting is how we get to know each other and why we feel guilty when we fall “behind.” Now and then, like today, we meet in person and give and receive good hugs.