Collaboration

col·lab·o·rate intransitive verb \kə-ˈla-bə-ˌrāt\:  to participate or assist in a joint effort to accomplish an end.
Synonyms band (together), concert, concur, conjoin, conspire, join, league, team (up), unite.
Related Words connive, affiliate, ally, associate, combine, confederate, hang together, interface, co-operate.

For starters, today is Robin’s day to post here at V&V.  Which is why she’s all over the place up above.  She’s there because…we collaborated!

It was a no-brainer once I had the brain fart.  Here she was on my side of the Pond, “short of eyes” while out-n-about in both Belgium and the Netherlands, often without internet access, flying home today (as we speak), and…let’s face it, outside her own world. 

So, after hanging together for 3 days this past weekend, Astrid with us, of course, we banded together and made the swap.  You’ll see her next Monday in my spot.

That got me thinking about virtual realities, the blogosphere, our websites…and collaboration. 

Vision and Verb has been around now for almost 3 years, thanks especially to Marcie, our founder.  A handful of us still remain who can remember those early days.  And while we’ve watched many come and go, we’ve connived to protect a sense of “family” through our daily cooperation with women “of a certain age” around the world.  Even with some men who’ve dared to show up!

When it’s possible to actually meet bloggers in real life, virtual collaboration takes on a whole new meaning.  I, for one, will never “see” Robin in the same way again.  Trust me.  I will read her posts with a different knowingness and hope you will, too, because of all those smiles you see above.

I felt the same way about Petra and Cherry…2 other collaborators I’ve been privileged to meet...along with scads of photo-bloggers at my own Shutterchance site when Astrid and I met up with them in England 3 years in a row.

Marcie and I have talked about how fun it would be to have a Vision and Verb meet-up.  Can you imagine conspiring to unite one day, teaming up for a day or weekend of interfacing with each other!  Sure, it would be nigh impossible to get us all together in one concerted effort…but even if it’s one person at a time, why not!  Next year I hope to meet Sue, just north of Atlanta.  And Marcie…maybe in NYC with Robin.  These things take planning, you know.

To be honest, I’m thinking about this because of a recent discussion about our joint effort here.  And because of my August trip back to Michigan with my family!  I know it’s not the same for everyone; we all see things differently.  But to and for me, you are sometimes a better “family” than my own biological family.  They say blood is thicker than water but my own experience allies more with “you can’t choose your family but you can choose your friends.”

Okay, so I’m the sister everyone else can read like a book, and maybe you’re not, but at least I come to our “home” each day to see/hear you.  You talk.  I pay attention.  I listen.  I try to get to know you a bit better.  You do the same.  Together we team up to make something very special happen…something unique.

I don’t care what anyone else says, I just have to say THANK YOU.  Thank you for participating in this joint effort.  Thank you for being part of this association to accomplish an end.

And thank you for making me feel like I belong!  I hope you feel it, too!

Collaboration

col·lab·o·ra·tion Noun
1. The action of working with someone to produce or create something.

Remember when Astrid and I had the good fortune to meet up with Vision and Verb cohort, Petra, back in February?  Well, chalk up another one:  our own virtual reality named CherryPie becoming real in England!

Here's where the collaboration comes in.

Astrid and I met each other as virtual realities on 31 August 2007 when we first commented on each other's Shutterchance blog that day.  Actually, she started it.  And true to Blogging Ettiquette 101, I followed suit.

Just before that time in my life, I had been typing away day after day on my other blog, documenting all the traveling I was doing with my ex-partner.  Half of every month we lived in Atlanta.  The other half we lived first in Hannover, Germany, and later in Amsterdam.  Because of all the pictures I was taking, I wanted to start highlighting certain images in a bigger/better space for just one image/day.  Bigger images, fewer words.

That's when I picked Shutterchance (SC), at the end of 2006, a photoblog originating in the UK. By the time Astrid joined the same photoblog and found me in 2007, I was already pretty "established" in the core group of Shutterchancers, building a sweet little community.  In just a matter of time, Astrid, too, became part of the core.

Within 3 months of our first comments to each other, we had the chance to meet while I was  in Amsterdam...and, well, you know how they say the rest is history!   By 5 February 2010 we were legally married, living together here in the Netherlands.

That was last year, and for our honeymoon, we flew to England to be with Shutterchance friends, meeting up with 14 of them.  THIS year, in celebration of our 4th anniversary of meeting virtually, with those first comments, we flew back to England and had another meet-up.

And this is where CherryPie comes in! 

Our SC friends collaborated and planned a meet-up at Dudley's Black Country Living Museum on Sunday, 4 September, while we were visiting.  CherryPie, from England, who visits and comments regularly on my SC blog, read about the meet-up and wrote me that she would like to join us, even though everyone else was from SC. She was willing to brave the unknown...just so we V&Vers could meet!  And we did.

Are we happy or what?!  (Astrid collaborated by taking the image.)  Two women of a certain age met each other virtually on the WWW because certain other women conspired and collaborated to make a blog called Vision and Verb.  Within a short matter of time, BINGO:  they too/two were able to meet in real life.

My guess is this is not the last time it will happen...for me or for the rest of us.  Don't you wonder who will be next?  (Yes, Astrid and I are taking reservations should you like to make it to the Netherlands!)

Visual Realities

This may be a first (?), two Vision & Verb collaborators meeting each other in real life.  Not Kath and Margie, of course, because they're sisters and that doesn't count!

We're both here in this image, in case you wondered.  She, Petra, is reflecting on her own photography and I'm there in the background, reflecting on her.

Isn't this fun!  Petra told us about her photography exhibition near her hometown here in Holland, about 35 km. from where we live.  We have wanted to meet each other since forever, so why not now.  Just do it.  Besides, Astrid and I knew we could make a photo-hunt day of it, which we did a week ago Saturday.  It was cold but sunny.

That same evening, once we got home, we sat in our nearby movie theater (something we do maybe 4 times a year) and watched teenagers and young adults playing with their iPhones before the movie started...gaming and texting.  Couldn't help but comment about the different world our kids live in today, much of which is virtual.  My 10-year-old grandson would much rather play with his hand-held virtual toys than ride a bike, for God's sake!

But here's the thing.  Remember when we used to write long, snail-mail letters and had to wait days before getting a response?  How many of us do that anymore!  When Dad was dying in 1995, we 8 kids around the state/country did most of our communicating via the phone.  Two years later, when Mom was dying, we were all using the internet, keeping up via e-mail several times a day.  Today we also IM each other and Skype.  All forms of virtual reality.

How many times have we said in Blogosphere that our virtual friends...the ones we've never met in real life...are every bit as real to us, if not more so, than our families and friends.  We may even feel more understood and loved by them...to the point that we we choose them to be our 'real' family.  After all, they know only the bits we want them to know...and are therefore more forgiving.

In my 6 years of blogging on 3 different blogs, including this one, I have met in real life close to 50 bloggers, not counting family and friends.  A handful of them I never see or hear from anymore, and to be honest, a couple of them were not anything like I had created them to be in my mind.  Most of you know that Astrid is my wife today because I first met her on my photoblog.  After 3 months of daily e-mail contact, I met her in real life.  Would she be anything like what I thought she would be?  OMG!  The minute I stepped off the train that first day, it was like lightning struck.  The virtual reality we both had created was in fact...real.

Which leads to this question:  how do we view reality these days?  Apart from the creepy, scary internet stories we dread and the paranoia we might have about divulging our identity, do we gain more than we lose by our blogging realities?  Do you want to meet your blogging family in real life, or does it scare you? Do you trust your judgment of people enough to want to meet them?  I'm guessing we'd all say a hearty YES.  So we're downright lucky when it happens.

In two months Astrid and I will fly to Oslo to meet two of my longest blogger friends, along with their wives.  With Petra, that will make 3 virtual friends this year already, and counting.  Maybe you'll be next.  Isn't that fun!  I love it.