Diving in to Steemit

You won't find many photos of me on the internet. I've had a personal policy against it for several years.

Here I am leaping from the front of my aluminum rowboat into a cold Canadian lake, mid summer, 12 years ago. It would have been a fishing (drinking) trip with 3 or 4 of my friends. My family had a cabin on that lake (out of picture to the right). My Grampa helped my Dad build it when I was a toddler.

My grandparents died, leaving my parents a lot of money and stuff. This caused my family to fall apart. Somewhere in there, my parents sold the cabin. I guess they needed just a little bit more cash.

What I wouldn't do for one more evening sitting around that campfire. The cabin was there for me for 35 years. I don't remember my life before it. It's the only place (other than my grandparents' house) that has always been there for me. Grampa had told me as a child that I'd be bringing MY grandchildren up there, someday.

He was a quiet but fiercely intelligent man, a deep thinker. He served for Canada in that hopeless world war, the second, saving many lives as a medic. He came home with TB and was given weeks to live. Later, he was given months to live. He gardened, he read, he solved puzzles, he loved puns, he collected stamps, he whistled under his breath, he stood in the back of the room to watch hockey games, he loved my grandmother, and I never heard him say a negative thing about anyone. He lived until about ten years ago.

My grandmother taught me about unconditional love. She loved lillies, but hated her first name Lilly, instead preferring her second, Joyce. Grama gave me Smarties when I was good as a little boy, she came to all my graduations through school and college, and she flew to New Zealand to see me as soon as I was born. In my memory of her, she's smiling and ageless, and all I can feel coming from her is love. She fell on her kitchen floor 2 years ago, and died the next day. I was with her until the end.

They're gone, their house is gone, their cabin is gone, and their family is gone.

I learned in group therapy (it's free in BC, but it's almost totally useless) that everything changes. Nothing is forever. Nothing bad, and nothing good either. It all changes. I already knew that, of course, but having somebody tell me made it sink in. Even great families eventually fall apart.

But here I am, diving in to the blockchain, plunging into the cold waters of decentralization!

My mission is to spread love and banish fear. Thanks, Grama and Grampa!
And someday, I'm going to buy back the cabin, with Steem. :)
<3
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