A bell's not a bell 'til you ring it... -- Oscar Hammerstein II

Much like the opening lines of the "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" reprise ⁽¹⁾, knowledge -- like love: doesn't exist "'til you give it away." Data become knowledge when they are shared, analyzed, verified. Or like money in Hello, Dolly!, knowledge "is like manure -- it doesn't do good unless you spread it around, encouraging young things to grow."

While sharing everything you know may, perversely, show up everything you don't know, knowing what you don't know gives you the option to learn it. Of course, there will be someone who will take that opportunity to say that it's your posterior, not your cranium, that has the intelligence,⁽²⁾ but y'know what? That's just him (or her) sharing his (or her) lack of knowledge. (READ MORE)

A couple of weeks ago, Kim over at Texting My Pancreas got together with a few other movers-and-shakers in the diabetes online community to create a project to support and encourage other people with diabetes. Called "You Can Do This", the project includes videos, blog posts, and artwork from people with diabetes, for people with diabetes.

It's sort of a crowdsourced Test! Don't Guess campaign, with two main rallying cries: "You can do this!" and "You are not alone".

It's not all unicorns and glitter.

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Every year, the "blue versus red" argument comes up as diabetes bloggers and patient advocates discuss the relative merits of the American Diabetes Association, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, the Diabetes Research Institute, the International Diabetes Foundation, and World Diabetes Day. This week, however, the color of diabetes is pink.

Diabetes UK pink.

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Wednesday I was stuck on nursery rhymes. Thursday, it was fairly tales. Reading the Wikipedia entry on Red Riding Hood, I followed the link to an entry on something I'd never heard of before: liminality. While Wikipedia has not nearly evolved into something rigorous enough to be considered a sole source for research, sometimes a new word or concept can shift something known and comfortable into an entirely different perspective; this is what that definition did for me.

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Rickydavid on Flickr

I generally consider myself to be fairly mature for my age. I've attributed my maturity to the experiences I've been through, mostly from dealing with a chronic illness from such a young age. It definitely puts a different spin on your whole life. You consider life as temporary, something to be cherished. You know you don't have all the time in the world.

Despite the maturity, I've still got growing up to do. There are things that diabetes and all my other experiences haven't taught me. I still have the passion and will of my youth to contend against on a regular basis. I'm holding on to pieces of that youth for good reason, seeing where maturity can change life for the worse in some ways.

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George mentioned in a recent post that he no longer supports the American Diabetes Association (ADA) -- just the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) -- because as a Type 1, he feels the ADA does not have his best interests in mind. I'm not sure whether or not I agree with George's assessment, but the ADA has programs aimed at the improvement of life and quality of life for all people with diabetes (regardless of type), while the JDRF is focused exclusively on people with Type 1/autoimmune diabetes. In that light, charity dollars going to an organization such as the JDRF may have a more concentrated effect on George's life with diabetes.

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