Dear Lindsay,

oh, baby sister, i read your blog today.

fired from your job for your voice!

no one told you, did they? a clear, powerful, female, voice, is a threat to the status quo. and the status quo has a rather large army.

lemme tell you a story.

this is the story of a grrl who wandered onto a list called the EGR-Irregulars-she's pretty sure she got the address from 'The Cluetrain Manifesto.' she was shy, passionate, intrigued, invited, and naive. at first, her posts were timid; she was so afraid of her own voice. then, she started to laugh and cry. then, she left her job before she was fired for the fun she was having on her company's website, inspired by Mr. Locke's EGR list, and by Mr. Locke, and by her own sense of truth.

she fell in love. she took exotic trips to distant islands. she played, she wrote, she broke free of all the restraints. her posts became like gasoline, at times, with matches in the attachments. some loved her. most hated her. she didn't care. she had a voice.

she took another job. menial, some would say, at Walmart. she still had no idea that voices carry. management at that job read her postings regarding her new position in the toy department. they didn't know what to do with her. she summed up the corporate situation rather quickly and signed a forbidden union card and hell was unleashed on her.

of course, originally, they only knew of her union affiliations because of her postings to EGR-Irregulars. after they knew, she figured it didn't matter who knew, and she went on a full blown campaign to bring Walmart to the union.

somewhere in the middle of this, i remembered something Chris posted about having made his own mistakes and...'you have to make your own..." and then much later, on the phone, (how i hate the phone!) he said, "i can't help you."

he was correct; he couldn't help me. only i could.

now, where was i going with this, Lindsay? oh, yes. so far, i haven't made any mistakes out here on the net, despite what it may look like on the outside.

but you have.

in your blog you said, "Good bye."
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