My Truant Pen

September 3, 2010

Top ten reasons you should move to Stoneham MA

Filed under: Daily living,Wider world — bflynn @ 8:01 am
Tags: , , , , , ,

So I’ve been waging a not-very-subtle campaign to get some subset of my friends who are “thinking about buying a house maybe some day” to consider doing so within convenient walking distance of my house. This is entirely selfish. It’s simply much easier to have a social life when you have friends on this side of the Big Dig.

Pony ride during winter fair on Stoneham Town Common

Pony ride during winter fair on Stoneham Town Common


In support of this attempt, I thought I’d put together a top 10 list of reasons you should move to Stoneham Massachusetts.

10. The local paper is hilarious. It assumes you already know everyone important in town, exclusively covers potlucks at St. Patrick’s church, and used to feature a safety column by Officer Rotondi, who was rotund. The safety column was excellent, with advice like “Do not put your credit card on the internet. Many criminals are now using the internet.” Best of all is the crime blotter. Every third entry has to do with someone calling the cops on the “youth” who were found to be loitering. One person called the cops because they saw a deer.

9. The Middlesex Fells reservation is part of Stoneham. Who knew that we had such an extensive quasi-wilderness area in sight of Boston? There are miles and miles of trails. You can take an all day hike, with excellent views of the city skyline. It’s close enough to Stoneham Town center to be a reasonable walk, or a quick bike-ride, and is open for cross country skiing and snow shoeing in winter.

The Fells in Stoneham

The Fells in Stoneham


8. Melissa’s Main Street Bistro has quite possibly the best menu I’ve ever seen anywhere, ever. Better yet, they deliver on the promise of that great menu. They mix an incredibly powerful martini (and delicious!) but the great news is that if you live here, you can just walk home.

7. We’re right at the corner of I93 and I95. You can find no better location for an equally inconvenient commute for you and your partner. We’re also 10 minutes from the end of the Orange Line (depending on where you are in Stoneham, it’s possible to get closer).

6. Stoneham Town Day! September 11th this year! (You can find this actually helpful information buried on page 6 of the newspaper….) There’s carnival rides, booths from every organization in town, balloons, politician’s kissing babies, raffles and fried dough. Fun for the whole family!

5. My neighborhood has a Walk Score of 80, which is very walkable. Grey can easily walk to: a grocery store, pharmacy, library, bank, post office, police station, park, ice cream parlor (2), about 15 restaurants, live theater, mechanic, bike store, hardware store, furniture store, homepathic store, dance studio, martial arts studio, 5 salons, and best of all, the Book Oasis. And more! As far as I can tell the only things you can’t walk to are the hospital (4 miles) or a movie theater (5 miles).

4. Local politicians actually walk around and knock on doors to personally introduce themselves during election season. I find this both charming and useful. I’m sure it happens other places, but I promise it never happened to me any other place I’ve ever lived.

3. The town square. It’s un-selfconsciously exactly what you imagine New England towns that predate the Revolutionary War to be. It has the bank, post office, funeral home, church, fire station, police station, town hall, park and Honeydew Donuts clustered around it. The church carillon plays music every hour on the hour between 9 and 9. Stoneham Town day is held there. During the summer they hold concerts on the Band Stand. Santa comes to visit in the winter. And every Tuesday in summer and fall we have a Farmer’s Market! You can see people taking strolls, sitting on the bench, or playing Frisbee on unscheduled evenings. Charming!!!

2. Housing prices have held up. The median home price is down about 10% from the peak and has risen this year. Stoneham boasts a nice mix of single family houses, multifamily houses for rent or purchase as a condo, and apartment units. It’s a demographically diverse and well-educated community, but not so upper class that you won’t be able to find a place here you could afford.

And finally, the top reason you should consider moving to Stoneham Massachusetts….

1. I live here, and you could hang out with me!

August 28, 2010

So you think I’m self-confident

Filed under: Daily living — bflynn @ 7:07 pm
Tags: , , ,

Part of being in your 30s is finally knowing a bit of who you are. You can get rid of that setting for four because you never feed four people: it’s either just your family or it’s a minimum of six people. You can pass on the lovely porcelain figurine you inherited because it turns out you’re not a knick-knack person. You can wear big jewelry and not feel self-conscious because you’re a person who wears big jewelry, and you really don’t have to think that hard about it.

One of the real joys of my late 20s and 30s for me has been being ok, downright comfortable even, with who I am. I can present at a big important meeting, speak in public, plan a party, sing the Halleluia Chorus, fix plumbing and make a peach pie. I know how to comport myself at an opera, and feel at home in fancy French restaurants (especially ones IN France… YUM!). After a quick look around, I handled a Turkish bath (with all states of undress) just fine. In all sorts of walks of life: from church to work to culture to leisure, I don’t ponder whether or not I belong. I just engage in what we’re there to do.

There is one huge, glaring exception to this.

Manicure/pedicure places freak me out.

This spring I went to get a mani/pedi at a local place. Like every single place I’ve ever been to, it was staffed by a variety of Asian women (I believe they’re generally Vietnamese?!) and attended by a variety of white women, all of whom seem to know everyone and be in media res with the latest gossip. There are at least two tvs on, with some incredibly annoying movie playing. The lady at the counter never makes eye color with you when she tells you to pick out your color.

The steps of getting a mani/pedi are like this intricate dance. You do the pedicure first. God help you if you didn’t plan ahead and are wearing socks and/or jeans. The person is usually chatting to their fellow technicians, while the other people getting pedicures are talking about all the people they know. There are all these steps to it, and so many of the customers there are there regularly — weekly even — that you feel like the only idiot who has to be told what to do. And there are all these unspoken things… do they take credit cards or only cash? You have to pay before they’re done, or you’ll smudge your fingers. How much do you tip? And you just KNOW that this gaggle of women will not hesitate to discuss any faux pas you may have made after you depart.

By the time I got out last time, I was nearly a nervous wreck. I felt ill with the strain of it — totally self inflicted of course. Granted, my fingernails looked great, but it just wasn’t worth it. I did my own nails the other night. The outcome wasn’t nearly as good, but the tv on had baseball and it hardly cost me a thing other than time.

So that’s me. Where are you unexpectedly uncomfortable? Where do you feel like an outsider, and despite your competence in many arenas, avoid?

August 24, 2010

Breaking news

Filed under: Daily living — bflynn @ 8:37 am
Tags: , , ,

So rumor on the street is that there’s a worldwide shortage of FUDGE dice caused by the emergence of a Dresden Files game using the mechanic.

I’m happy to say that I was cool and using FUDGE dice years, YEARS before the bandwagon fans did. My house is well supplied with FUDGE dice, as well as enough D12s for a whole HORDE of barbarians.

D6 gold, baby

D6 gold, baby

We have an unreasonable amount of dice. Grey could correctly conjugate die/dice by age 2.

Ahem.

In slightly less geeky news, batch 3 of plum jam is popping away on the counter. It still looks darker than last year’s magic batch. I wish I knew what varietal it was. I’m pretty sure these aren’t damson plums, and from what I’ve read I may have to track down some damsons for yet another batch, because they sound awesome.

Grey brought one of his Star Wars books to school today and read it to his class. I wonder if he pronounced the “r”s? It’s funny what even an open-minded parent like myself won’t put up with.

OK. Dice shortages and yet another jam update. That’s a sign that I should leave you all to your sweet dreams!

August 20, 2010

July 30, 2010

Ten years ago

Filed under: Adventures,Daily living,Wider world — bflynn @ 2:38 pm
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I will be here

I will be here

We are in last phases for our trip to Istanbul. The boarding passes are printed. The bag are packed and by the door. The chargers are being slipped into luggage. The debate is raging whether fresh grapes will cause any anguish in security. I am seconds, seconds away from putting the auto responder “You’re on your own, suckas!!!” (or the professional version thereof) on my work email.

I worked very hard today, and it’s tough beginning to peel my mind away. I’m awash in all the details of two very consuming projects at work. There’s the million and one things I do to keep my household and my family running, “Ok, Mom, Magic needs to get her pill morning and night. Thane eats Life cereal with milk… with his hands. You might want to wait until after breakfast to dress him. And if there are apricots in the farm share, would you mind dicing and freezing half a cup? I’m just short for a batch of jam.” All these things that I carry and remember and think about… now is the time to lay them down. If I haven’t explained something to my mom, well, she’ll figure it out. If I haven’t addressed an issue at work, well, they’ll either have to cope or wait. If I’ve forgotten something, it will have to remain forgotten for a week.

This is why we go on vacation. Because we must see how much we are laying down, and then when we return we can choose how much to pick up again. Maybe, perhaps, the perspective of that freedom of going away will show that some of those things we work so hard to sustain are not worth the energy they sap from us. On the other hand, some things we deal with as mundane requirements of our day to day life are revealed as the shining jewels of existence they are. (See also: bedtime reading time)

I am so ready for this. Tonight we will crawl on a plane — the same flight, I think, I recently took to Amsterdam. It feels funny to have Schipol become, instead of this exotic destination across the world, a familiar place where I’ve mapped out the Starbucks, thankyouverymuch. (Funny note: also on the flight will be a friend from church headed to his family in Denmark. The world is a small place.) I promised a colleague in Amsterdam I’d wave as I landed. I have a bunch of Euros from my last trip to unload, so I think some good chocolate at that nice stand is in order.

Then I start travelling space I’ve never traversed before. Never in my life have I been to Turkey — not even as a squalling bairn (which is, for the record, how I was dragged through much of Africa and Europe). I will set foot on Asian soil for the first time in my life, this trip. We are hoping to visit Hagia Sophia, the underground cistern, the Bosporus. We may take a day to go and visit Ephesus. My husband and I will read, eat, walk, talk, read books, play games and celebrate (get this!) TEN YEARS of married life. Ten years ago this week, we honeymooned in Greece when we did largely the same sorts of things, plus the beach.

These new things – experiences, memories, contexts – will provide rich fodder for my mind and spirit when I return. I know this. I still draw strength from the joy of our pre-kid trip to Austria & Italy. I’ve packed all these books on Byzantium so I can truly BE there and feel the weight of 1500 years of history. I will breathe Belisarius, Justinian and Theodora. I will hear the echoes in ancient cathedrals. I will, I’m sure, meet new characters from legends I have not yet learned.

Sometimes, lately, I have felt rather boring. The things running through my mind… they are largely not things you would be interested in. Much of the time I’m not even interested in them. Not that this is why I have not been blogging lately. No no, trust me. I am perfectly willing to blog about boring stuff. I haven’t been blogging lately because I am SUPER BUSY. But even if the super busy isn’t much affected by wandering Byzantium, the boring will be. My mind will have all this new stuff to process — things I have learned and done for the joy of them, instead of for the need of them. I am so excited about this.

And then there is my love. My husband. My joy. My partner in chaos, parenting and gaming. We are very good partners and enjoy each other a lot… when we can focus on each other. But through necessity, many of our interactions are tactical. “Who’s picking up the kids today? What are we making for dinner? Did you pick up the cat food? Do the kids sound too quiet to you?” I so intensely look forward to talking with my husband about the larger things in the world – those same things I’m eager to put into my mind. After ten years of marriage, I love my husband deeply. I also like him. I can’t wait to be with my friend and my beloved, and to have a great time.

So it’s time to kiss the kids and wish my parents luck with Camp Gramp. It’s time to shut down the computer for (gasp!!!!) like 9 days. It’s time to fill up a memory card with tourist pictures.

I will pick you up when I return. May blessings abound.

April 16, 2010

The gym

Filed under: Adventures,Daily living — bflynn @ 8:24 pm
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I am not a gym rat. I have never had a gym membership. I’ve generally been sort of unsure how they work, except they seem to involve getting up early in the morning and having a wardrobe of specialized clothes for looking good while sweating.

Well, it turns out my new job has an onsite gym. That all my colleagues are regulars at. That costs a grand total of $25/month of which $150/year is reimbursable through my health plan. That has everything you might possibly need, including cable for day Red Sox game. On contemplation, this seemed pretty hard to forgo. So in early April I bit the bullet, wrote a check, and decided to try to figure it all out.

I’d like to take a moment to thank my junior high and high school gym teachers. At the time, I thought it was the height of unfairness that SCHOOL where I was supposed to be GOOD at stuff was making me do things that I didn’t know how to do and was bad at. I had to learn whole new skills like lifting weights, running, stretching, and even doing pushups. Despite my early despair, this education made doing sports seem plausible. And sports taught me how to be in shape and negotiate fitness, in addition to how to work hard at things I was terrible at in order to attain hard-won mediocrity. I went to state in basketball and track (through no merit of my own), and have varsity letters in things other than Knowledge Bowl and Pep Band. I haven’t done an organized sport since my sophomore year of high school, but I have confidence in my ability to do physical things that require sneakers and sports bras. This was not inevitable.

An adult gym seems very different. I mean, there’s the whole subtext of locker rooms. The thing about locker rooms is that you are naked in them. Not metaphorically. So there’s my boss’s boss’s boss, and there’s someone who works in the cafeteria and we’re all getting our clothes on for Zumba class. It’s very equalizing in an “I hope I don’t make a complete idiot of myself” kind of way. There are fitness friendships that spring up far across corporate divisions. And then there’s the issue of unspoken etiquette, which I’m sure I don’t know all about. Does one attempt to hide under the insufficient towels, or is one unafraid as one walks out of the shower? There are brushes on the counter in front of the mirror… do only idiots use them? Are they just for show? Or is it ok for me to use them? And these are my coworkers — people whose opinion is important — so it’s important I not commit huge faux pas.

I suspect I might be oversensitive, since the jr. high/high school locker rooms was the place where “gross” “freaky” and all the other terror-terms of my youth were defined — where being “normal” and “like everyone else” was the height of my desire. Perhaps the payroll coordinator is more forgiving of foibles than was the norm in 7th grade.

Also, among my areas of ignorance is hair dryers. I’ve just never used them, never mastered the art of them. I only own a hair dryer for putting up that plastic sheeting across the windows. A hair dryer is a must if you’re using a corporate gym, because really? Sopping wet hair does not say “professional”. So in addition to Force, Java, an entirely new business, and powerpoint for everything I have to master hair dryer skills? It seems too much!

The good news is that I’m really not in all that bad a shape. I did 25 minutes on an elliptical without trouble. I ran a mile and a half on the treadmill. (I do love those day games!) I’m up to 5 visits. I think this is going to work for me. But I find it like a strange new world with all these rules and customs I need to carefully wend my way through.

What about you? Are you comfortable doing vigorous exercise? Do you have a gym membership? Is it like a second home to you, or a foreign country?

April 13, 2010

This post brought to you by Deadliest Catch

Filed under: Daily living,joy — bflynn @ 9:38 pm
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I don’t watch much tv. I have never seen an episode of Friends, Dr. Who, or Glee. Frankly, if it weren’t for baseball, I’d be more or less ok getting no cable whatsoever. (But there is baseball. Do not underestimate baseball.) But on Saturday, a friend came to stay with me while my husband was away with our friends on the Cape. One thing lead to another, and we spent most of the evening watching Deadliest Catch. I have to admit, I love this show. On bad days, it makes me insanely grateful for a desk job with benefits and a practically 0 chance of having 32 degree Bering Sea water dumped on my head. On other days, I reflect on the ties back to a former age. Interspersed with sonar readings and hydraulic cranes are age-old superstitions and an environment where men teach each other to be men in the oldest ways — as men have in the ruggedest environments since they first plied the waters. It’s an interesting environment for a feminist to see. I can tell you this much: I couldn’t hack it. I’m pretty sure that after 20 hours of backbreaking labor I’d be in tears and handing in my resignation.

Thane loves the park. It has the BEST garbage!

Thane loves the park. It has the BEST garbage!


I figured that as long as he didn’t go around preschool saying, “What the *beep* took you so *beeping* long to *beep* bring me my *beeping* Legos?” this was a pretty good show to watch. The only violence is against crabs. And there’s a truth to it. Of course, now he says he wants to be a fisherman because “It looks like fun.” Clearly he’s not paying attention.

Since I complain plenty when the boys are hard to handle, in fairness I should tell you that they’ve been just amazingly lately. Thane has stopped clinging to my leg like a screeching limpet while I make dinner. Now he’ll play with cars (he LOVES lining them up on a table, taking them down, and lining them up again). He has this Spongebob figure he’s extremely fond of. He, like his brother before him, calls the little yellow guy “Bob-bob”. He’s talking up a storm. He’s extremely interested in whatever his brother is doing. One of his most frequent words is “Gwey”. He’s also recently become obsessed with apples. Normal people will eat a great apple down to the core. With Thane, if he’s hungry, he’ll eat the entire apple. As in, there are no remnants of the apple left when he’s done. Apple is also one of his clearest words. At the height of apple-mania, I believe my 25 pound son (or so) ate about 5 apples in one day. There was a dinner where the boys collectively turned their noses up at pizza and preferred to eat apples instead. I confess that one left me not knowing how to feel. On the one hand, children should eat their dinner. On the other hand, apples are likely much better nutritionally than pizza.

Project “Teach Thane To Walk” has been going extremely well. Thane will now walk considerable distances holding a hand. The other day, he walked all the way down the block with me. This may not sound astonishing, but he has little legs and strong opinions. For him to nicely walk such a distance past so many distractions is real progress. Grey is quite a walker. My friend who spent Saturday brought her pedometer. We walked 3.7 miles that day. Grey walked all of it with us, and with the running around and jumping, much likely significantly more. I look forward to the day when all four of us can walk through the woods together (and not stop every 3 feet for a snack).

Grey has been super and fun and a delight (with one or two exceptions). I’m continually stunned by how USEFUL and HELPFUL he is, and how we can DO things with him. For example, we played several games of “Kids of Carcasonne” and he followed the rules and played correctly. He was also compassionate towards his parents (possibly not getting the idea of a game) and helped us complete our roads. He’s really, truly, honestly reading. I asked him to read a book to my friend, and he read through the entire thing with one mistake. He said “not” when the word was “never”. And it wasn’t a book he knew by heart — he was really reading it. (The book in question is Today I Will Fly). He is superb with Thane… most of the time. It’s a joy to watch him run and jump and play and make friends. And he’s very loving towards me. He’s also really sensitive. The other night he said he was scared. As I carried him to his room, I was talking about all the reasons he should be happy and ended with “And all’s right with the world.” He replied, “No, it’s not. There was that earthquake, and all the people got hurt.” He’s right, of course. All is right in his small world, but not the larger world. I was struck by his awareness that just because everything is good for him, doesn’t mean everything is good.

Little boy blue

Little boy blue


Monday is Patriot’s Day. It’s a state holiday. While theoretically it’s about some historic thingamajig, in reality it’s a day when Boston shuts down to watch some baseball and then watch the Boston marathon come through. There are some battle recreations in the morning, too, I believe. I have to work, but the boys’ new preschool is closed for the day. So I called Abuela tonight to ask if she’d be willing to take the boys. You know, she sounded really, really happy to hear from me. She really wanted to hear how the boys were doing. She said she really missed them – and I believe her. I’m caught between feeling great and feeling sad. Feeling great because it was such a great relationship for so long. And of course, feeling sad because I don’t see how that relationship can be well continued (although I have suspicions that if the Y takes Patriot’s Day off, they probably take all the other holidays off that I don’t get).

I hope that all is as well and joyful with you out there as it is for us!

April 11, 2010

Typical Monday Morning

Filed under: Daily living — bflynn @ 8:52 pm
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Things that need to go out the door with us tomorrow:

1 18 month old
1 4 year old
4 lunches (one of which needs to be microwaved in the morning)
Sheet and blanket for 18 month old
Blanket for 4 year old
2 laptops for work
2 power cords for laptops
Change of clothes for my gym (2x)
Shampoo, conditioner and face clothes for same
Aikido gi & spare clothes
Aikido weapons (wooden sticks)
Purse
Keys
Coffee mug
Coffee thermos (full)
Coats all around, maybe
Bills to mail

Also, since it’s the Monday for it, I need to have sheets out for every bed in the house and a check on the counter for the housekeeper.

No wonder I don’t have short term memory for much of anything these days!

April 2, 2010

Three cheers for Marmee!*

Filed under: Daily living — bflynn @ 10:58 am
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My mom has come out to visit. I know Holy Week might seem an odd time for a pastor to be a continent away, but Spring Break coincided with Holy Week this year and she is also a teacher, and so she came! My father is coming out in a week or two. My mother-in-law is coming out towards the end of April when I am going to FRANCE (and Amsterdam) for WORK with an agenda that has a bullet point for WHITE ASPARAGUS SEASON. This whole work thing is going fantastically, if you ask me.

Anyway, it’s sort of feast or famine with help for us. For reasons I’m still attempting to work out, our relatives are less inclined to visit us in February? Why on earth do people not feel downright DRAWN to New England in February? The mind boggles.

But it’s been awesome having my mom around. I sometimes feel guilty for how hard it is not to take my mom’s time and help for granted. Like of course she’ll make me my favorite cinnamon rolls. And of course she’ll get up with the kids so I can sleep in. She’s my MOMMY. She’ll take care of me FOREVER. And then I think about 27 years from now, when I’ll be where she is now, and wonder if I’ll be so gracious. It’s a sobering part of parenthood to remember that everything you expect from your parents, your children should have a right to expect from you. Do you hold your folks and yourself to the same standard? I hope my husband and I can live up to the ones set for us!

She took the kids on Sunday, after church, so my husband and I could be cultured dilettantes. We went to the Museum of Fine Arts, courtesy of a neighbor who gave us tickets. We wandered the dim remains of The Secrets of Tomb 10A and marveled at the items which have traveled so very far through time and space to arrive before us. We ate overpriced pastry at an artistic table and drank cappuccino and no one interrupted us. Then we had dinner in Cambridge, followed by an evening of gaming and hanging out with friends. We didn’t get home until late. It was AWESOME.

I think a little more concerted attention, as well as the final arrival of his in-process molars, has really helped Thane. He’s developed a deep and abiding love of apples. You wouldn’t think such a little guy with so few teeth would be able to eat an entire apple, leaving nothing behind, but you would be wrong. “Appa! Appa! Appa!” Happily, it also keeps him occupied while a grownup type person cooks dinner. It will be interesting to see if he’s permanently leaving the “Cling to mom’s leg and weep while she prepares dinner” stage behind, or if he’s just taking a hiatus with it while he has Grandmama to shower attention on him. He has started talking a mile a minute. I was trying to remember if this was 18 month old standard, or if it’s Thane-specific. The nice ladies at daycare comment on it nearly every day, though, so I’m thinking Thane specific. One of his favorite phrases is “E-I-E-I-O”, which means exactly what you think it means.

Grey is just full of awesome. I LOVE LOVE LOVE 4 years old. He’s so much FUN. The imagination is off full tilt. The knock-knock jokes rise to new levels of zany. He’s solicitous and loving. He’s finally ceasing to NEED the naps that he dropped nearly a year ago, so is less tired. He remembers everything, and we start to get precious glimpses of his life without us. [DIGRESSION: including the fact, which we'd completely missed, that they don't heat up his lunch at preschool. They do for Thane, so I ASSUMED they were warming Grey's lunches of soups and casseroles which all were designed to need heating. But no. Cold spaghetti. Cold potato casserole. Cold everything. NO WONDER he didn't eat his lunches. I wouldn't like cold macaroni and cheese either! So after a bit of foaming at the mouth followed by a bout of self-recrimination I took the blessed opportunity of another grownup in the household to run to Target and buy thermoses. Star Wars themed. Because I pay attention to the patter, which now has a strong, if ill-informed Star Wars bent. "Did you know that Annakin cut of Dark Vader's head?!?!?" /END DIGRESSION] Grey plays these wild, imaginative games with other kids. Yesterday one of his friends came over and they disappeared and were playing games with shifting rules defined by parameters grownups can’t possibly imagine. Delightful. With me, in the blessed space cleared by mom making dinner, Grey and I turned into Annakin and Luke Skywalker, with Thane playing a surprisingly convincing R2-D2. There were laser noises and epic light-saber battles up the stairs. Even Thane got into the laser-noise action, bopping around saying “pew pew pew!”

And after the truly epic deluge of the last week, today the sky has emerged washed clean. The lawns are greening up. The forsythia is out in shocking yellow to color-deprived eyes. My hyacinth waft perfume on the afternoon breeze as I return to my home in daylight. I will not be TOO cold in my Easter dress this Easter, for possibly the first time EVER. And the Easter Bunny has brought some fun stuff for two little boys. I’m in an Easter spirit and frame of mind, this Good Friday.

Anyway, there – sans thesis statement of unifying theme – is what’s up with me lately. How about you?

*Bonus points if you catch the reference

March 12, 2010

Hey, that’s me!

Filed under: Daily living — bflynn @ 4:15 pm
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I’m always interested in the spots where I seem to react differently than other people do. I wonder why, what part of my personality and upbringing combine to create this unusual reactions. I’ve lately been thinking about my astonishment when I see something I know in other circumstances.

What do I mean? For example, recently a celebrity crime occurred, which got a moderate amount of news coverage. By that I mean that you could go to the CNN home page at the time and find a link to the issue. Well, that crime happened not only in my town, but in a house that I can see from my bedroom window. For a week or two, there were news vans circling our neighborhood. I could tell whether the affected family was home or not by just looking up and seeing lights. I debating whether bringing cookies to a neighbor I’d never met was an appropriate response. But I got this odd shock and thrill at hearing the name of my town, the picture of my neighborhood uttered by these national media outlets. People I’d never met from faraway walks of life knew the name of my town! I was surprisingly surprised by it all.

Then came the acquisition. I have a few media sources I access regularly: NPR, The Economist, CNN.com, Boston.com. On my morning drive in, I heard NPR make the announcement (thank heavens I already knew from having checked my email the night before or who knows how my driving would’ve been affected!). The Economist has it in the first page summaries. CNN didn’t carry much coverage, but the Boston Globe had a big ol’ story, with a picture of my office highlighted on it. It felt really weird, as though I’m a part a big important multinational company, or something.

Oh, wait.

So I got to thinking about why I don’t expect to ever hear about my town, or my company. I was raised in a town of 400 people. We got bused over a mountain pass for Junior High and High School to a booming metropolis with fewer than 2000 people. You can live in the town that has the closest cinema, and never have heard of the town I grew up in. It’s off the road on a dead end, and only has something to offer if you like fishing and beer, preferably simultaneously. (The town roughly quadruples in size on the opening day of fishing season.) When people ask me where I grew up, I usually either lie and say Seattle, or ask them how well they know Washington geography. This town is so remote that it wasn’t covered by any meteorologist or weather report. (I mean, my dad has a weather station now, but when I was a kid? Not so much.) Can you imagine if you listen to the radio to catch the weather report, and it’s for a place 60 miles away and 2000 feet of elevation change lower? You could gather the big patterns, but you shouldn’t expect to ever hear the name of your town uttered, or know about the weather in advance, or even hear news coverage about something that happened.

Then there’s the companies I’ve worked for. The first one, professionally, had a grand total of 5 people. Most of the rest of the company was related to the founder. (I just checked. They still have 5 people, most of whom are related to the founder…) After I was laid off on Mother’s Day, I went to a much bigger company. I mean, there must’ve been 15 or 20 people there! Through acquisitions, it might’ve gotten up to 40 by the time I left… to go to a company where I was employee #6. Again, there was growth in that company as well, but never past the point where we could all meet in one conference room. So three small to very small companies, that stayed small companies. Of course they weren’t usually profiled in big business journals or the Economist — the impact they had on the wider world was limited. This is the first time I’ve worked with a company big enough to make the news. So no wonder I’m surprised when I see and hear my company talked about in a large audience.

I come from a small town and have always worked in small companies. I expect no one to know where I come from or where I work. It’s surprising to find in my adult life that neither of those is true.

How about you? When you tell people where you’re from, do you expect them to know where that is? When you talk about your company, do you have give the 5 minute elevator speech explaining what it does, or does everyone already know? When you see something you recognize in the news, is it “of course” or “omg I can’t believe it! I know where that is!”

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