for far too long.
I am going to have to say some things to this community that do not come easily to me, but that have been owed for a good long time now. I know that I tend to blow things off with jokes, so please understand that this is absolutely serious.
What I have to say, what I owe far too many of you, is thanks. Thank you.
Let's start with navajo and the SF Kossacks, without whom we would never have gotten out of the Bay Area when the misfortune was that we could no longer afford to stay.
SallyCat, who is tending my sword collection, also gets a mention here. Admittedly my sharp-pointy collection is based more on memory and less on value, which makes me even more grateful that it's well taken care of.
Many of you, too many to list, offered your homes, job leads, and encouragement, and I appreciate it deeply, but my parents called and asked for help, so we went out to Arkansas. Along the way, homogenius opened his home to us and accompanied us to Disneyland, which helped us to make it a fun family outing rather than Napoleon's retreat from Waterloo.
Well, tryptich2 had offered us a place to stay out East if things got bad with my family, which, naturally enough, they did. And you all know what happened after that. Thank God they saved the car, though.
But with us at our lowest, Daily Kos, Cafe Wellstone, and the Wreck List stepped up. Grassroots Mom got the guild together, with Eddie in ME and cmairead gathering help from the NE Kossacks. brillig and mik called in with offers of help from Cafe Wellstone. And of course there was Actbriniel and her wonderful diary.
So.
So. We're safe. We have food in the pantry, warm clothes (with more coming in every day), and the few people that I pointed out above doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the help that we have received from this community. I wish I could list it all. I should. But the prospect of going through dozens of messages, hundreds of emails, phone calls, everything from job leads over the past year to anonymous, ridiculous donations of money, to the people who called or texted or messaged or DMd on Twitter or emailed and said "Hang on. I've been there. Hang on." I just can't, just physically can not list each and every one.
At some point, all of you get the credit. So, looking at the lit Christmas tree that we couldn't afford with the gifts that burned in the fire we came all too close to losing the Little Loner in (and parents out there know that she could have been a mile away and still it would be Too Goddamned Close), knowing that for a while my family is safe and warm and among friends, I have to - poorly, awkwardly, as someone unused to basic human decency - look back on the last year, the last few months, and wonder what I could possibly have done to deserve this; what I can possibly do to repay it.
I don't want to belittle or ignore anyone's gift. Again, if I could name all of you I would. Hell, by protocol, I owe all of you a holiday card and handwritten thank-you note at minimum. And it's not the money, not just the money, but the ten thousand kindnesses - large and small - that have gotten us to a place which could very much be home.
And on top of it all, someone who I'm not sure it's OK to mention gifted me with a dKos lifetime subscription. Though I'll miss the feeling of smug self-satisfaction when the page fills up with World of Warcraft ads, that Blizzard made a major ad buy on Daily Kos and that this is very likely my fault, the speed at which Big Orange loads now is worth it, and apparently I'll be getting free e-books and all as well.
So, part of what I wanted to say was Get a subscription because if any community in this cherry-blossom World is worth staying a part of it is this one. Imagine the reaction on, say, Red State (like anyone reads Red State). Another part is that I'll never, ever use the phrase die in a fire again. But mostly, awkward and inadequate as it sounds to me, I need to say thank you.
Thank you. Thank you all.