This blog is an experiment in communication.
Kendal at Longwood, the retirement community where I live, offers a variety of ways for its residents to communicate. Some of them (meetings, bulletin boards, our “open mail boxes” for written notices, the monthly print newsletter) were rendered unusable for a time by the restrictions required by Covid-19. We couldn’t meet; we couldn’t go to the Center to see the bulletin boards; putting notices in the the open boxes (or retrieving notices from them) was only possible two days a week, and the newsletter had to cease publication.
Our resident-run website turned out to be an essential channel of communication (as did our in-house cable TV channel, for those without web access). Emergency messages were broadcast via a phone-message system. Zoom software rapidly became a replacement for in-person meetings and social gatherings.
But it turned out there was also a role for a medium where longer stories could be posted. This blog helped to fill that role. It has been a place to preserve the story of our shared experiences in a very unusual time.
I write about what life is like for my wife, Jan, me, and the community around us. To other residents, I say: please submit posts from your perspective too. This blog is meant to be a community tool.
— George Alexander
On the Kendal Journey 