To start, I must apologize for taking such a long break from this newsletter. Although I have valid reasons — explained below — for my absence, I should have published this last week. I won’t let such a long time pass again, without explanation.

As some of you know, I experience a number of disabilities that I manage with mixed results. I won’t divulge the specifics of my conditions, but….time runs very differently for me when I’m in the midst of a crisis. I think we can all agree that the past two years have been a crisis. The long and short of it is that I ran out of steam / energy / spoons to deal with everything about two weeks ago. The result is that I’ve “lost time” to other pursuits; my commitment to this newsletter was lost in the shuffle. (I’m still working on the same piece that I started two weeks ago — subjectively realizing that I’ve spent hours on it, while two weeks have past me by). My difficulties with time, itself, are the main reason that I’ve been unable to work for over three decades. I can’t think of an employer that would accommodate my “condition”.

I offered to be the editor for this newsletter for many reasons:

• Our struggles as PWD need more exposure.
• Our stories have proven to be global.
• Given time, those Leaders™ that claim to hear us may actually start listening if we can collect enough stories for them.

However, I didn’t account for the limitations that my disabilities place on me — by extension, the commitments that I make to others. That was reckless, somewhat ego-driven, and dishonest. I can’t apologize enough for this. If I am given the opportunity to continue editing this newsletter, I will be more forthcoming in the future.

New Focus

I’ve decided to suggest / introduce some changes to how this newsletter is presented. It must be more than a weekly aggregate of stories affecting the #PWD community; there are many perfectly competent sources for that. Given that, I propose that each week I will highlight stories that are connected by a common theme: community advocacy, hidden disabilities, community reactions, outstanding abled allies, etc.. I will continue to provide helpful links to the sources of these stories. But, the meat of each week’s newsletters will be the beginnings of — what I hope will be — ongoing discussions about the connections between those stories. This newsletter will move from a “guided tour” of what happened to an actual multi-path resource about what those various stories mean to #PWD.

My hope is that this change in format will be both beneficial to the #PWD community, and a means to lessen my own personal difficulties with time. Having a clear focus helps me to better connect the various chunks of time that I experience. Assuming no world-ending interruptions, I should be able to publish newsletters on a reliable weekly schedule.

I would really like to hear the thoughts of our community on this. You can comment directly on this update or connect with me through my twitter handle. Please know that I am fully dedicated to supporting our community to the absolute best of my abilities.

Be well, Gentle Reader,

Gryph

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