In the early weeks of my love affair with the internet, I visited the web site of Dave Siegel, the guru of web design, and on his site discovered a link to his journal. He was opinionated and he had readers who corresponded with him on his soapbox.

He started a discussion list where people who wrote to him about his journal entries could also write to each other. You could join this list if you wanted, and participate (or not) in the conversation. It was not to be a list about technical web design stuff; that was strictly forbidden. It was to be for the layperson who just wanted to talk about any subject. Another list would eventually be created for those who wanted to exchange technical information; the Daveworld list was to be a community parlour, where everyone could participate if they chose.

Meanwhile, Dave carried on with his journal.

A list member who had an online journal of her own wrote a guest entry in Dave's journal. I responded with an email, and she suggested I think about joining the Daveworld mailing list.

Eventually, Dave decided to stop writing his journal.

The Daveworld list carried on under its own steam. At the moment there is not the high number of active members there have been at various times. It's cyclical and traffic depends on what topic of conversation comes up, and what's happening in people's lives, of course. But Daveworld has taken on a life of its own and, while the banter can be funny or sweet or serious or just goofy, I have come to care for these people and consider them my friends.

Spring is still on the list, of course. She's a Daveworld staple, now living down in Florida with Sean, another DW oldtimer. Marcus is in the humid southern U.S. too. There's Katherine, writing whimsically and yet so earthily from her Moab dome. She's been with the list since its inception. Jeanne is in Mexico City, busily building her house which is her personal work of art. There's Derek, one of the few Canadians (all very nice--ahem--naturally) currently active onlist; there are two Scotts, whom I interchange regularly in my mind and will until ScottR supplies a photo; Marya's our punny California Girl in her house of constant cameraderie.

Beth had her first baby, and it's been a lovely ride she's shared with us on the list. It's such a pleasure to see her with this joy. I don't think it's been easy, but she wouldn't trade her little treasure for anything. Ceridwen's been awfully quiet lately, but with a passle of kids and a new paper route, we know she's busy and probably didn't remember to re-subscribe after our last round of technical difficulties. Hopefully she's back among us soon. Sasha is the maestro who keeps the list running smoothly -- and usually it does. But when upon occasion it goes down, Sasha takes care of the problem in record time.

They've been visiting each other all over the place, too. Judy, an unsubscribed dubber (dw'er) (once a dubber, always a dubber?) who lives in Chicago, took a trip to see Jeanne in Mexico and then went to visit Katherine and stayed half a year. They've met for cheesecake/carrotcake/Isaychocolatecakeorbust. They've met for a vegetarian feast or an ice cream cone at the beach.

There have been several romances, and mini-reunions, mostly stateside. Sometimes Canada seems a million miles away from all the action.

Over in South Africa, Steve has been with us from early days. So has Stephen, who hails from Australia. The list once had another Steve too, and with all three of them posting regularly and Dave himself never participating onlist, there was some joking about whether the list name should be changed to Steveworld. Now it tends to be dubbed Davelessworld.

Pat is an American, now a translator living in Norway. Timothy is in Virginia, a painter of the colours of the spirit. Darius is your consummate California Boy, from whom we are still expecting photos of the neverending kitchen-remodelling.

I'll be sitting here all day if I try to mention everybody, and I'm sure to miss many. Suffice it to say, I've mentioned some of our lifers. We haven't heard much from deAnna or Stacia lately -- both newlyweds, donchaknow. We happily welcome all newcomers, and prodigal sons -- like Macker, our resident Church Guy, who took a little hiatus and is back in full force, and recently Amy, a new mom who's popped in again after a long absence.

We lost Nonie in 2001. She posted regularly and heavily for years and died suddenly from pancreatic cancer. In a way, she died the way she said she'd choose to -- quickly, not long-drawn-out -- so we couldn't begrudge her leaving us the way she did. But it hurt to lose her. She was loved, and to us she is still a part of the list -- just uncharacteristically quiet.

This is a sketchy little background about the group of people I call the Denizens of Daveworld; it doesn't do the list dynamics justice. It can't. You have to come and see for yourself. It is a community rich in character and intelligence, heart and humour. We are friends as well as online acquaintances. I go to them to share goings-on of my life and to hear about theirs; when I need any kind of information, I can post my question to the list and someone will invariably know the answer or point me to it; they give me much to think about, help me look at life from a different perspective than my own, and pretty much endlessly entertain me. They make me laugh all the time.

I have found friends among these people, and I would like to introduce you to them. Would you care to join us for a cup of coffee or a beer (you need to be drinking something you can spew on your monitor when someone makes you laugh), and see if you find yourself jumping into the conversation?

If so, please send an email to majordomo@3sheep.com, with

subscribe daveworld

in the body of the message.

Give yourself a couple days to pick up the conversational threads so things start making sense. It might take a day or so to hook you -- it took less than one day, for me. I thought I'd lurk for a while and get a feel for the atmosphere, but someone's question about movies stimulated me to jump in and I've been a dubber ever since.

I wouldn't be without it to savour with my morning cups of coffee. And my late-night glasses of wine. And my wee-hours-of-the-morning, quiet-in-my-housecoat insomnias.

It's a wonderful list, with wonderful people, and I think you'll like it. So whenever you're ready -- your teeth don't have to be brushed, your hair doesn't have to be combed, and you don't have to put on clothes or deodorant -- come 'set a spell.'

Kate

SeaJay had a funny adventure on NYE, and posted it to the DW list. With her permission, I repost it here...

How do you know you're "getting older"?
This way:

2:00 AM - New Year's Eve/Day

"Ma'am, can I see your lisence and registration please?"

"Um, yeah. It's here. I think. Ah shit, spilled my coffee... I don't maybe I left it... no wait, I think it's under the seat ... shit....no.... um ... maybe I don't have it."

"Ma'am, have you been drinking?"

"Just a thousand cups of coffee so I could stay awake this late."

"Would you step out of the car, please?"

"You have got to be fucking kidding me."

"Just step out of the car."

"Um, I'm in my pyjamas."

"Pardon me?"

"Pyjamas."

"Um..."

"See, I'm picking up my kid from the New Year's festivities and I had to get out of bed and, you know, take an extra geritol and put my teeth in and try and remember where I put the keys and keep the cat from running out the door and then the garage door got stuck and I was running late and I was, you know, getting kind of pissy, so I said, you know, fuck it, and left the pyjamas on. And now, AND NOW, I will have to sleep until next Sunday just to catch up and, believe me, if you make me get out of this car I will cry. Just because it's so unfair to get old, ya know?"

Now he's laughing. Not with me, I might add.

"Okay, okay. Is this your car?"

"Jesus H. Christ, man, who the hell would lend ME their car?"

Now he's wishing he had one of those hidden cameras.
By now the plates are run on his little computer and he asks me some questions about where I live and FOR THE LIFE OF ME I could not think of my street name. - Not as bizarre as it sounds - often autistics lose chunks of well known data if stressed.

"Um, cripes! Over there. Just over there. You know, past Polo Park. Okay, from my bathroom I can see Rae and Jerry's. OVER THERE! The one with the brand new roof - which is why I am in my pyjamas instead of an evening gown."

He's not sure now what to do.

"AH, I remember ... Strathcona Street." I said finally out the window to him while he was conferring with someone. And then I rattled off my DL number and the first 10 digits of my car serial number and my SIN and started in on my Health Number when he waved me away. AND I mean WAVED me away - with his whole body. You know -"Go! Get the hell out of here!"

You do not want to know about the next part where I get to the pick up point and have to go inside a crowded place to track down the kid who is not in the appointed place. The upside is that she was so embarrassed that she will never fail to meet when she says she will again.

Oi.

I don't blog. Besides not being much of a writer I have so many other things to do that I doubt I could find the time to write something each day. As it is I can't find the time to read most of the really cool blogs I have come across. Not having a fast connection it takes time, not to mention money, to reach out across bitspace and read each of the interesting blogs, journals and news pages that I would like to keep track of.

That is why I like, and sometimes think I am addicted to , mailing lists. With a mailing list the data comes to me. I can read it whenever I wish. If I don't have time today, it will still be there in my mailbox tomorrow. I can choose to read posts in detail, just scan through them or even delete threads en masse if their topic does not interest me.

Most of the mailing lists I subscribe to are technical. Only two are not. Firstly there is Armytalk, a group of old and serving soldiers, bolstered by journalists and military writers and topped up with a sprinkling of those who have no military experience other than an interest. Secondly there is Daveworld.

I often feel that I am out of place in DW. So many members are intellectuals, able to write copiously on subjects that I have only the scantest knowledge of. They talk of movies they have seen and books they have read. Ones considered art that I would not even contemplate viewing or reading. Sometimes I finish reading something or watching a movie and think that I might post to DW about it but don't, because it is not what many would consider art. I like to project an image of not caring what others think of me but somehow this is not true in DW. I care very much about the way other DWers see me and find myself witholding things that others might see as trivial and not worthy of discussion. Sometimes I go through agonies, when, having posted something I think will prove interesting, there are no responses. Sometimes I even worry that there is a parallel DW in which my posts are trivialised and ridiculed when I see no responses. My conscious mind scoffs at this but the subconscious remains unsure. This is the reason that I rarely start new threads. I prefer to read what everyone else has to say and give some input when I have it.

For all this, I love DW. It is the only contact I have with such a diverse group of people, with so much experience and knowledge of the world. Although I sit here at the tip of Africa and have not met any of you I like to think of you as friends.

I look at the DW of today and think back to the days when we might have a hundred or more posts in a day and there would be many concurrent threads running. Other the past few weeks there have been very few posts and it seems that DW is, if not dying, just slowly fading away.

Some say this is due to the fact that DWers now write in their blogs instead. I hear that Beau is to marry. "Yes", somebody says, he told us in his blog. I see this as evidence of the decay of the DW family. In times gone by such information would have been trumpeted on DW and discussed at length. Now it is hard to tell whether Beau is even a subscriber any more.

I miss the DW of days gone by and hope it doesn't die.