Meeting other J-landers!

While I have added alot of entries in the last couple of days, I cannot let the weekend come to a close without mentioning my delightful lunch Saturday with my wonderful J-land friends.  As I have mentioned previously, my son has been somewhat hesitant to accept his mother's journaling.  He acts as though the people I talk about, connected to my blog, are my imaginary friends.  Well, I have photographic proof now that they are very real and are true friends. [You may recall that I recently learned there were other J-landers near me in Dallas and we decided to get together for the first time.]

               

Yes, that is VivianSulliNwank (Nwanyiomas Journal), Jtuwliens (Mirror, Mirror on the wall), emmapeeldallas (Talking to Myself) and DBP2000 (Dust Bunny Protector), enjoying a four and a half hour lunch on Saturday!  The only person missing was Judith's sister, Julie, the other half of the Twin-dom who could not join us since she was out of town. 

It was so nice to meet with other members of the AOL journaling community and feel an instant connection.  We each have our own unique style and yet we found we each had much in common in how we approach our journaling.  We share a lot of ourselves online and yet we keep much of ourselves in reserve.  

I know that many of you have expressed excitement about our outing and I'm going to share a few of the things you might have learned, had you been with us.  It is anyone's guess who revealed what.  What happens in Dallas, stays in Dallas - kind of.

We range in age from 40 to 56 *** We are married and divorced *** Kids - none to four *** Our children range in age from 13 to 28 *** Two of us are directionally challenged, even with a map *** One of us is a grandmother *** Three of us have done the internet dating thing *** We all dislike the drama we see at times online *** Democrat and Republican *** One has been with the same company for decades *** One just started a new job *** One has a boyfriend *** One stayed at a bed and breakfast with her ex recently (okay - it wasn't the way I made it sound :-/ ) *** One talks to her ex-boyfriend almost every day *** One talks to her sister several times a day *** Two of us have studied psychology *** One of us has a masters degree *** One is working on her masters *** One is a twin *** One has twins *** One enjoys karaoke *** Three were nominated for VIVI Awards *** One is jealous but remains upbeat .... grrrrrr *** One lives in a neighborhood where the streets are all named after desserts *** All four live in a house *** All four recognized, by the end of lunch, they each had three new friends *** We all realized we are smart, sassy, talented women who love J-land, enjoy our journals and can draw the healthy line between the internet and real life.

And, we all plan to get together again soon!