I'm Famous (tee hee!)

Ever meet someone who is well known?

Well, years ago I met Barbara Sofer, a Jerusalem Post columnist, whose opinion pieces I actually read.

We met in the locker room at the pool. We talked while we changed, and were quite friendly.

Since she is a more public figure, I occasionally learned about life-events in her family, some happy, some not. But I switched pools years ago and, though I knew she would recognize my face, I did not think she would remember my name, or recognize it in an email. So, though I thought of sending her a "mazal tov" or a condolence email, I did not; I did not think she would know who it was from.

Well I guess I should have sent those emails, because I recently received a "remember me?" email. We met again at The First JBloggers Conference and she did, indeed, remember me from the pool!

She asked if she could quote from my blog and refer readers to it. (Is the sky blue?)

I was so touched that she remembered me and that she knew about my cancer/blog.

She wrote a very nice piece and was very kind and generous in what she writes about me. You can read the full article, The Human Spirit - Embracing Pink.

Towards the end of the article, Barbara Sofer writes "Matitya's blog somehow manages to be unbearably sad and inspiring."

I know my posts have been particularly heavy recently.

Still, I don't want my blog to be "unbearably sad."

Life is good!!


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What do you think?
Is my blog sad?
Is a sad blog good or bad or both?
Please be honest!



Please daven (or send happy, healing thoughts) for RivkA bat Teirtzel.

With love and optimism,
RivkA

How A Technophobe Became a Blogger....

What was I supposed to do?

I was supposed to be done with cancer!

Instead, the cancer was back and had mysteriously spread from my no-longer-existing breast to my bones, liver and lungs.

Suddenly everyone wanted to know how I am doing.

I could barely cope with the news. Every time I talked about it, I started crying.

I could not make a million phone calls. I did not have time to send either personal or group emails.

I had three young children and I did not know how I was going to get through the next twenty four hours. (That panic persisted for weeks!)

Still, I did not want to blow off my family and friends.

A friend suggested I use a blogging site for people dealing with health issues. It made sense, but I did not want my identity to be defined by illness. So.... I found a user friendly, "normal" blogging site, and, despite my latent technophobia, decided to jump right in and start blogging.... I just needed to choose a blog name...

Wow, that was almost as hard as choosing names for my kids!
(Did I mention that my first child had no name for over two weeks?!!)

Late one Saturday night, my husband and I were hanging out with a serious blogger friend (Jameel) and his wife (Jameela). For over an hour, we brainstormed about a name for my blog. We came up with.... nothing. (worse than nothing -- we had a list of really lame names). At midnight, we called it quits.

As we were leaving, I mentioned to Jameela that I was making "coffee and chemo" dates with friends.

"That's it!!" shouted Jameel, "that's the name of your blog!!"

And so it is....



Please daven (or send happy, healing thoughts) for RivkA bat Teirtzel.

With love and optimism,
RivkA



(Cross posted here)

I'm famous!

A while ago, I received an email from Aryeh Dean Cohen from the Jerusalem Post. He wanted to interview me for an article about people who blog as a way of coping with their illness.

Always happy to share my thoughts, I agreed to be meet with him.

I enjoyed the interview.

Aryeh's perceptive questions compelled me to examine why I blog, what are my goals and what I get out of the process. It was quite enlightening.

We spoke for a while and I wondered, as I always do, how my ideas would be reflected in the article. Would my words be twisted, or would the interviewer capture the essense of what I said?

The article finally came out in Friday's magazine section and he "got it." He managed to capture the business of my life, my struggle to figure out what role cancer plays in my life (and whether it has a major or minor part), and what I hope to get (and give) by blogging.

He actually wrote an introductory piece, entitled "A Healthy Outlet", and then he writes about four indiviuals, including me, who are blogging, among other things, about their health issues.

Check it out:

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1207159751510&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


(Thanks to muse, at me-ander, for linking to the article and my blog)

(Thanks to Rafi, who linked to my blog in Haveil Havalim #160 The Waffle edition)


Please daven (or send happy, healing thoughts) for RivkA bat Teirtzel.

With love and optimism,
RivkA