Losing Connectivity

The immaginable happened. Driving home from visiting law schools with my daughter in Washington D.C. I pulled out my laptop to get a little work done. Clicking it on, I was faced with the unexpected - the hard drive breathing a message equivalent to the black screen of death. No config systems program working. I responded with a determined, yet calm sense of determination. Turn it off. Turn it on again. No luck. Calm determination prevailed. Perhaps it was a glitch in the daylight savings patch. Arriving at home, with electrical connectivity, brought no further light on my predicament. Help would have to wait until Monday when I could connect with the technology team and resolve the proble. The evening was earrily quiet, calm, yet lacking in a certain energy. Monday arrived. Logged into the network at school, which I had somehow inflated as a possible solution to the problem. No luck. The black screen of death lived on. The technology support request followed, by the email detailing my concens, by the phone call reaffirming my concerns, resulting in the relinquishing of th my laptop to the technology team for hopeful repair. Over thirty hours have passed. Loss of connection, withdraw, isolation. I am lost without acess to the resources I have gathered, tagged, and saved. I yearn for the connection I have with the community of educators who inspire and encourage me to look to each tomorrow with renewed vigor and hope. Their voices echo in my head. Determination, inspiration, insight, collaboration, shared vision...the power of a network of passionate educators...connected to one another, pushing each other's ideas to new heights and depths. The power of connection is a vital reality. How do we make the connection vital for our students?