Chapters end

 Indecision about whether the word 'chapter' should have an apostrophe or not! Chapters do end, hence I'll let the headline stand. Although the genitive would also be very apposite as the first half-year of 2013 recedes into the past. Google Reader is a chapter closing. My first RSS tool was Bloglines, but I very quickly switched to the Google service. At the end of 2006... as this post indicates... my morning perusal of the feeds was a precious routine as soon as I had checked the overnight emails at the office in Abu Dhabi. At one point I had about 140 subscriptions, although these have now been reduced to half that number.  

I felt that the combination of reading RSS feeds and writing this blog was perfectly adequate for my communication needs. Facebook never held any real appeal and since I am probably by nature anti-social, subsequent developments like Twitter were of little interest. When Google decides that Blogspot has had its day... and I am well aware that anything digital is by nature ephemeral... I dare say there will be alternative which will present themselves, much as Feedly will now be the means by which I shall satisfy my hunger for the latest news on the interwebs.

Back in May 2011 I wrote... "For my daughter and I have for many, many months been accustomed to having the Skype messaging window permanently open when we are both online. It is for us like sitting at opposite ends of a long, long desk stretching from Maastricht to Munich. The Long Desk is a comforting form of 'telepresence'..."

It was not only comforting but a pure joy! But that is another chapter now ending now that Jessi's three years at Maastricht University is over. The upside is that for the next few months she will be back here in Munich where her internship looks as if it could be very interesting. And when again there is a geographical hurdle to be overcome... if she takes up the internship she has been offered at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C... we'll extend the Long Desk across the ocean. 

For many, many years when I was working in the Sandlands and she was in school in Munich the ritual contact was a short telephone call to her before she left home in the mornings. It was at the time very important for both of us. But the 'always on' Skype window is incomparably better, enabling both of us to feel present during each others' daily lives.

Another chapter ends this weekend. For two and a half years I have been doing daily translations for the German automotive-themed media group Motorvision.But now they have decided that my services are no longer required. Admittedly I have found their international strategy to be somewhat inconsistent and so the termination of my contract came not so much as a surprise.

A shock, nevertheless, since now I must urgently seek a new source of income.

I wonder if this means that my professional activities will no longer revolve around automobiles? For the five year from 2005 to 2010 'the cars were the stars' of our GearOne television channel uploaded from Dubai Media City. Now in 2013 I can hardly imagine anyone who has never been in possession of a driver's license who is better informed about motoring matters than I am! Were a lottery win to enrich me I think I might go for a 2005 Ford Thunderbird 50th Anniversary Edition, a car so beautiful that I think I would have no difficulty finding willing drivers. 

Yes, chapters of all kinds come to an end, even if dreams persist. 

Amusing that this is Sandlander post number 2013!