09 January 10

How does your influence extend

I’m always surprised to meet someone who has heard of me, or knows of something I’ve done. The internet and meeting most of my friends because of it hasn’t changed that. So I have to admit (cause these thoughts are prevalent lately) that I have no idea who all would miss me if I were to die. This isn’t a cry for people to come out of the work and say “ooh, me!”. It’s not a cry for attention, but thank you if that was our instinct.

After reading words written by literally hundreds of people now about Brad Graham and how much he influenced them, even people he never met in person, I’m amazed at how far his reach extended. I think he might have been, too. I’m sure there are a lot of people he remembers meeting briefly, and remembers emailing with. But I know I can’t remember all the people I’ve briefly met or emailed with in the last year, let alone 10. And I’m no where near as popular or prolific as he was.

I think the moral to this story, if there can be one is two-fold. One, you have no idea who you are going to influence or how. Long before I’d met Brad he left a comment on a post I wrote about an uncle. And this stranger just appearing out of nowhere and saying hello and thanking me for having written it was touching and it encouraged me. Even if I’d never met him, I’d have that memory to think about and reflect on how it has stuck with me.

The other moral, is that our words can and probably should live on after us. This writing we do feels so ephemeral and momentary that it may not seem like much. But these pixels we put on CMSs of various types all over the world are the equivalent to previous generations letters, written missives, chap-books, and zines. Even if something were to happen and the family of the creator decided that those words could never be published, we at least have a record that they existed and that record can be stored in a library or a private collection for anthropologists and historians to use in future referencing of materials. But hard drives can be erased, accounts can lapse and be deleted easily.

Thankfully Matt Haughey and several others know enough to figure out how to make sure that at least for the short term Brad’s main writing will continue to appear online, which I imagine is exactly how he would want it. But if he doesn’t have a will, and if his next of kin finds his “hobby” of writing about himself and his life all over the internet distasteful, they have ownership of the information and can delete it at will.

So, your action item, is to think about what you want to happen to your online legacy (yes, even if you only have 3 readers) after you’re gone. I know of someone who has enlisted a friend to post a photograph of her dog everyday for 1 year after she passes away so that at the end of the year, people will be glad to see the crazy dog lady has stopped blogging. I think she underestimates how many people enjoy seeing pictures of her pup. But what would you like to have happen to your online writing?

I know I want mine to stay. I don’t have a will (something I know I need to rectify), but if a blogpost can serve as my legal wish. I want my site to remain as is for as long as technology will allow. I give Andrew Huff rights to all of my writing upon my death. Should something happen to him, I give these rights to Veronica I. Arreola. Should something happen to all of them, I give these rights to my mother. I don’t list my mother first simply because technology isn’t something that is second-nature to her and dealing with her loss of me will be stressful enough.

Comments

  1. Hi Cinnamon,

    Have you ever read ‘The Great Divorce’ by CS Lewis, allegory of heaven/hell or not? There are a few great stories lines/metaphors for who we are in life and what that means after we depart. One of the lines I am thinking of is the lady who in the afterlife is a great queen with a great following, as the story wends on you learn that in life she was just a lower-middle class English housewife with an abusive alcoholic husband. What she did do is small acts of kindness that transcended her circumstances and when she passed on she was quite surprised that all those small acts had added up to a large dose of love.

    That is how I see Brad, his humor, his willingness to be kind to everyone, his wicked wit, etc. Each interaction, be it online or in person was yet another act that contributed for good and now we see the ripples out of the love.

    To make another literary reference, Jean Rhys who wrote ‘The Wide Sargasso Sea’ once said: (paraphrase) “If Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky are the great rivers that feed into the ocean of human creativity, then if I am but one tear that drops to the ground that follows to a small stream, that follows to a river, that follows to the stream, then my life has been worth it.”

    This is how I feel. Regardless of how myopic our vision may be now, to be kind, gentle, and to keep creating regardless of size, fame, and impact, is of tantum importance as we have no idea how our actions, words, and creativity will touch another being, hopefully for good.

    Yes, I am an optimist. ;o)

    — Ms. Jen on Jan 9, 10:15 pm

  2. I’ll check out that book, Jen. I appreciate you sending me the link. And I think you’re right. I think keeping the goal of being kind, gentle, and creative is a wise one. I’m an optimist as well. Generally. Or at least I try to be. :)

    — Cinnamon on Jan 11, 03:27 pm

Commenting is closed for this article.

  ·