***Won't you share the joy of WYFP? Please recommend. :-)
Okay,
There's this long-running diary series, you may have heard of it, called--pardon my French, I didn't name it--"What's Your Fucking Problem?" I adopted it a while back, did it for a while, then I had to miss a week because I went out of town to the big peace march in DC; somebody else did it that week, and was going to step back from it and see if somebody else picked it up the following week. But I don't think anybody did. Please correct me if I'm wrong!
So, I can't help it... my effing problem is that I think there should be a WYFP every Saturday. And if I don't do it, it might not get done. And that would be a... well it would be another Saturday without WYFP.
I'm not gonna let that happen, not this week anyway. I present to you: WYFP.
I even found a totally awesome quote for your enjoyment from the alt.callahans newsgroup FAQ:
* What Callahan's Is, and What Callahan's Isn't
One of the most important concepts borrowed from the Callahan's Place books by Spider Robinson is the axiom (as paraphrased by Aahz):
"Shared pain is lessened, shared joy increased; thus do we refute entropy."
This forms the basis of much of the interaction in the group. Patrons often make a toast when something sad or happy happens in their life. The sharing seems to do just what the axiom says - it makes the pain more bearable, or makes the joy more wonderful. Patrons have shared many significant events in the past; everything from losing jobs, pets, or close relatives, to falling in love, graduating, or having a baby.
The shared joy comes pretty easily, but the shared pain can be more difficult. Often a Patron will simply make a cryptic toast and not wish to talk about it any more. That is fine. A very important thing about sharing pain in Callahan's is that we do it voluntarily. People will always listen if you want to talk, but they should never pry. In Spider's books there is a character called Fast Eddie, who is quick to use his blackjack on anyone who asks a prying question. We think that's reasonable - so prying into other people's business here is strongly discouraged.
Sometimes, however, a Patron does want to talk about something painful in detail. While we can almost guarantee that people will be willing to listen and sympathise, we CANNOT make any claims that we will be able to help in any other way. We are a group of relatively normal people; we have no magic powers to make people's lives better. The Callahan's of Spider's stories could weave a certain magic, and the stories always had happy endings. But this Callahan's is just a newsgroup. This is reality, not a story.
We try very hard to listen to people. If someone has a real problem, we even offer advice. But advice is not always right, and it's often worth exactly what you pay for it. The important thing to remember is not to harbour false expectations about the power of Callahan's. Some people have, and have been sorely disappointed.
Having said that, however, it is also easy to underestimate the good things and emotional support which can come from sharing. It is easy to be cynical and say that Callahan's is just a bunch of weepy pathos groupies. That is just as much a mistake as overestimating the power of the Place.
In summary, alt.callahans is just a newsgroup. But it's a newsgroup in which the Patrons make an honest effort to be real friends with one another. We are a friendly bunch, in general, and if you need some friends, we're always here. But we can't do anything which a more normal sort of friend can't do.