Generations filter catastrophes differently.
When the reports of a school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School started early last Friday morning, I needed my buddies from the Class of 1967. In 1963, we had arrived at all-women's Roman Catholic College Seton Hill, in Greenburg, Pennsylvania, wearing hats and gloves and left four years later to navigate the cultural revolution and later the women's movement.
I found those women who had to change over and over again on Facebook. The conversations ranged from somber to critical. Charlotte Toal represented the first. Lee Harrison the latter when she disagreed with the opinion-editorials I had published on Odwyerpr.com on the what should be done to prevent the next Sandy Hook. Here you can read it.
Sure Facebook has its flaws. Last May, in THE NEW YORKER Steve Coll announced he was pulling the plug on being the friend to 4,000. But the social network is there for us in times of crisis and, yes, joy. A colleague called me from the south tonight after she read on Facebook I received a bonus from a client. Several weeks ago I received a flood of "notifications" when I shared that I didn't have breast cancer.
Before social networks like Facebook it was more difficult, perhaps impossible, to reach back in real time to those who were our support system before that concept had ever been invented. Let's hope in the new year we won't need so much support.
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