Mrs. Denmarkguy has been away in Seattle to be with our daughter who gave birth to her first child a few days ago. There were some complications, so "having grandma on hand" has been kind of important.
Because the house is quieter than normal I've had some time to be in my thoughts while doing yard work, business bookkeeping and house maintenance tasks and such.
Anyway, the arrival of our 4th grandchild reminded me of one of the key reasons why I felt Hive was such an attractive proposition to begin with: this whole notion of decentralization and "the immutability of the blockchain" seemed like the perfect platform or place to store stories and content you wanted to be sure was available for a long time.
Historically, I have always had bad experiences with blogging/photo sites either putting up sudden paywalls, or outright shutting down, and there are few things I loathe more than seeing a bunch of time and sweat equity getting wiped of the surface of the planet, without notice.
I always enjoyed hearing stories about my Auntie's early life and my grandparents' lives, but they were invariably just passed along verbally and once those people just away it seems like the stories went away as well.
Granted, not everybody's interested in genealogy, or in family history for that matter, but some people do find it interesting to learn more about where they came from and how the people who were BEHIND "where they came from" lived their lives.
Which brings me back to the point of what we all actually use Hive for, and the fact that I'm finding it more and more compelling to start telling some of the stories that aforesaid grandkids might be able to look at one day and understand more about where some of their relatives came from.
For me, there are a couple of stories I can think of that I am interested in telling.
One of them would be one of the stories I've been touching on recently of how I actually was a beachcomber for a living for several years before the opportunity went away. It's one of those things that's unusual enough that few people would believe it unless the story were actually told.
The other is a little more prosaic (perhaps?) and relates to the fact that I'm actually a Danish citizen living in the United States and there is a story to be told of how a young man from safe and established Denmark ended up traveling halfway across the world to attend university in Austin, TX. And yes, there definitely was some culture shock involved in that!
I suppose we are sometimes hesitant to tell our stories in a public forum because who are we, after all? I'm by no means some kind of historically significant public figure of any importance or notoriety — I'm just an ordinary person going about my relatively ordinary life.
That said, I think we all have interesting stories of one kind or another, and their stories worth telling.
Going back far beyond the beginnings of Hive on our old legacy chain, my interest in the Internet and the whole online environment was always far more based around people and stories than it was about just about information. I know many people see the online world primarily as a sort of encyclopedia and never think bout the people, but that's not me.
Part of that, I suppose, has to do with my longtime interest in psychology and the human condition, but instruction manuals and car maintenance tips are not exactly content I read for enjoyment!
Wait, what am I saying? It is of course true that there is a large segment of the population who would never dream of putting "reading" and "enjoyment" in the same sentence! But I think you get the picture...
Anyway, these are just some thoughts I've been rolling around in my head, because outlining a story is also a good exercise to do while you're doing something relatively mindless like mowing the lawn or trimming bushes.
Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you're having a wonderful Sunday!
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Created at 2025.04.13 11:17 PST
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Wes & Grindan