The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and that in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt.  -Frederick Buechner

I realized the other day that I’ve been online for 30 years this month. Yes, you read that correctly, 30 years. Before there was the World Wide Web and AOL there was Prodigy, and privately owned ISPs like  Telenet, USENET, CompuServe (the first to offer real time chat), and my first ISP,  The Source, a small company in McLean, Va., that offered both chat and something called “user publications.” User publications were bulletin boards that were the precursors of blogs. I had one of the first 10 “web pages” in the United States. It was a satirical little ditty called The Par Mtn. Telegraph.

Personal blogging is a strange business. You sit at your computer and share your thoughts and experiences, essentially your life, with strangers. You often wonder if anyone notices what you send off into cyberspace and if they do, do they really give a damn? If you’re lucky, you get some occasional feedback, and if you’re very lucky, you sometimes make a connection with someone really interesting that you can identify with. These past few weeks, I’ve been very lucky for I have connected with former marine biologists Ernie and Cathy Wheeler, a couple who detoured off the fast lane and decided to raise their two kids in Cripple Creek, Va.

Ernie and Cathy publish Solace at Cripple Creek, the latest addition to my blog roll.  Solace is a personal journal of two progressive and multi-talented people trying their best to become self-sufficient and raise their children in a natural environment apart from a world that increasingly makes no sense. Their posts are chock full of useful links, interesting and sometimes beautiful photographs, and just plain common sense.

I recommend that you start at the beginning with their first  posts in March 2009 listed in the archives and read forward. You learn as they learn about such subjects as rabbitry, breeding, bee-keeping, and food preservation thru canning and dehydration. Their musings reflect the growing frustration the people of this once great country are starting to feel as we become more  aware of the betrayal of our major institutions – government, business, banks and even our churches. It’s a scary world out there, but I now know where to find a little solace.

Oh, if you’re like me and can’t help yourself when you read or hear the words cripple creek, here’s a little something for you.