By David Fortier 

Come Sunday morning, the youngest son will have landed in Australia with his partner for an adventure that will last for at least one year. Allison will be working there, and they will be staying in an apartment provided by her employer. If they can manage it, they would like to stretch a year into several or more. We have received several photos via text, the last one from an Aldi in the neighborhood where they will be living. 

On a different trip, the oldest will be wrapping up a visit to Georgia, as in country, not state, where he is visiting a college friend, who has been teaching there for a couple of years. The friend plans to return to the states soon, so this is a once in a lifetime trip for the oldest. He has sent a few photos, the most recent from the hills above Tbilisi, the country’s largest city and capital. 

And on the home front Sunday morning, Mary will be staining the windows that I sanded over this past week. If we are lucky, we will get them back in the window jambs this week. Then, we can start moving furniture into the living room and bedroom. It’s only been since April that we have been at this. Yes, that last sentence should be read with a sarcastic intonation.  

This coming week Bristol has its Third Community Conversation with a keynote speaker, Kamora Le’Ella Herrington, from Hartford, who will talk about the power of self-reflection and personal decision making as forces for change in society. That program is open to all and will be held at the Rockwell Amphitheater on Wednesday, Aug. 3, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. The formal program begins at 6 p.m. with introductory remarks and Herrington will speak at 6:15 p.m. A question and answer session with Herrington will follow the talk. 

The Diversity, Equality and Inclusion committee of the Bristol Parks, Recreation, Youth and Community Services department organized the event. The committee is asking all participants to register at the beginning of the event so that a survey can be sent via email to gather reactions and suggestions. 

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Reading/listening for this week is back to a recent podcast segment from the Ezra Klein Show, entitled “The Mid-Century Media Theorists Who Saw What Was Coming.” Click here. The episode is a heady one, but it breaks down some of what we are learning about the effects of social media and how what is happening can be explained.  

In a separate piece, one that appears in The Atlantic, author Jonathan Haidt takes a strong position about the impact of social media on society. In his opinion, it is not good. Click here for a link to “Yes, Social Media Really Is Undermining Democracy.” 

Regarding The Bristol Edition, we are online but we have resisted much of the trappings of social media—we do post via email and share via Facebook, but we have tried to limit our online presence. Lately, if you have noticed, we post around 7 a.m. and again at 4 p.m. Our model is the old newspaper which had a morning and afternoon edition. We are hoping this helps our readers by providing a reasonable gap between reading, that is absorbing information and digesting it, before having to consider new information. At least this way, our readers will have a chance to draw their own conclusions about this information before being overwhelmed by new information. 

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A couple of tips for our readers. Depending on your internet service and email provider, it makes sense to mark TBE so that our emails do not end up in spam. Also, we are trying to figure out how to manage our mission of providing local news for everyone most affordably. To do this, we need more readers to contribute so that we can all share the expenses.  

Please note: New contributors will have to set up an account, with a username and password. Once this is done and you sign in, most times, your browser will remember the information so that you do not have to retype it each time. If you are having trouble, please email me at dfortier@bristoledition.org.

Yes, we have had financial supporters come forward, and we are grateful for your support, but we need more to begin to put into place our plan for more expansive local coverage. If you have already signed on, thank you. If you haven’t, please sign up today and join these other local news supporters by clicking here. Often we hear people bemoaning the condition of local news, here is a chance to do something about it.

“Come Sunday morning” is intended to be a weekly review, a recounting of the past week and an anticipation of week to come. Among its features will be reviews of old and new books, sharing of favorite podcasts, some family news, Bristol events and happenings and issues surrounding education, work and community journalism. He can be reached at dfortier@bristoledition.org.   

All TBE readers, supporters and donors     

The Bristol Edition will be limiting the number of stories non-members and free readers may access each week. This decision is based on our financial projections and, most certainly, to remind people that TBE is serious about providing accurate, timely and thorough reporting for Bristol. To do this we have devised a financial support structure that makes unlimited access extremely affordable, beginning with a $6 monthly donation.     

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