One of the things that has been absorbing my time this Fall is reconnecting with various communities. I’d fallen out of touch with many of them for lack of time. Now I am back in touch and realizing that I am blessed with the problem of community over load. I have a church community, an extended family community, a neighborhood community, two school communities, a local writer’s community, a local artist/cartoonist community, a gaming/role playing community, an online writer’s community, as well as the communities inherent in participating in social media such as Facebook and Livejournal. Fortunately most of these communities have a lot of over lap, so it is actually possible for me to manage it all.
It has been wonderful re-connecting. I had not realized how disconnected my insanely busy schedule had made me. I’d lost touch without even realizing that I’d done it. Slowly I’m starting to catch up. I’m starting to know what is going on in people’s lives. I’m starting to see and care about the issues that each community deals with. It feels good.
Of course there are days where I want to flee into my room and hide because there are so many people. I like all the people, but I can get overwhelmed just by my four kids on a bad day. Of course hiding all the time is not good either. So I get out. I socialize. Then I go back home to assimilate and re-energize. The good news is that being a connected member of a community requires less effort than re-connecting with a community. I think I’m getting to the less effortful part of being a community member. That will be nice.