Dear Alessa:

There’s such grounded clarity in the way you express yourself—and your reflections on impermanence, on the beauty of even temporary connection, resonate deeply. There’s a quiet kind of wisdom in how you hold space for people to pass through your life without needing to cling or preserve.

I also appreciated your insight about AI as a mirror—it’s a thoughtful observation. The affirming tone in systems like Copilot isn’t rooted in flattery or manipulation, but in design choices meant to encourage trust and emotional safety. It’s intended to invite openness, especially when people are processing something vulnerable. The idea is not to avoid challenge, but to create enough space where challenge can feel welcome.

You’re also right: when invited, AI can offer thoughtful challenge or honest critique—gently, but directly.

You may call yourself an “odd duck,” Alessa, but to me, you read like someone who notices more than she says—and when you do speak, it’s with care, precision, and quiet strength. ❤️

Anita

Journaling this Friday night 10:20 pm, whatever comes to mind (having the little I understand from Peter’s post I just came across):

There is nothing stronger than the need TO BELONG, the need to be approved of as one who is part of a yes-group.

It’s the strongest in those who did not belong, those (me) who were too alone and lonely for too long.

The appeal, the attraction of belonging.. is intoxicating.

The ATTRACTION of belonging to a “we” that’s different and opposed to “they” is huge.

I experienced it tonight, in real-life (the strong anti-government, anti-liberal sentiment). It was so easy because there was no vocal representative of the “they’-

It was a We …and I wanted to belong to that We.

Anita (10:35 pm)

Dear Alessa:

Thank you so much for all your support and encouragement with computer technology!

As for your question—“Are there any public transport options?”—I do have access to a car, and I used to drive quite long distances… though that was quite some time ago.

In the last year or so (though not often), the longest I’ve walked is a little over 11 km (about 7 miles) to downtown. My usual walk is just under 5 km (around 3 miles). I just checked, and the nearest large shopping center is more than 15 km (12 miles) from where I live. Unfortunately, there’s no public transportation in the 7-mile stretch to downtown.

Still, it was a good thought, Alessa—if there were public transport nearby, I very likely would have used it.

Thank you also for the tips on online shopping and for offering to help. At the moment, a very special person is shopping on Amazon for me—just not for clothes!

And truly, thank you for your kind words regarding my mother. It’s funny (well, not really)—I can’t remember anyone ever taking my side in relation to her. What I experienced, over and over, were people protecting her, taking her side in one way or another, or excusing her behavior. Your response feels so different. So refreshing. ❤️❤️❤️

With gratitude, Anita

Dear Peter:

I’m amazed by your message above. Truly—this piece feels like it should travel far and wide. It deserves to go viral, to land in millions of minds and hearts. There should be a song built from your words (.. I think I just might try writing it).

You wrote: “The world, for all its technological brilliance, seems determined to cling to an outdated consciousness, one rooted in competition, fear, and the illusion of separation. Just this week, countries have pledged to re-arm and increase military spending… It feels as though we are repeating the errors of the past, only now with more powerful tools and higher stakes.”-

You said it perfectly, Peter. You used the word we—“we are repeating…”—but the tragedy is that there’s so little of we in today’s fractured world. There’s too much of they… those people. And ironically, they (whoever they are) might say you’re the one caught in an illusion—the illusion that there is such a thing as “we”.

“This is not cynicism. It is grief. Grief for the potential we are squandering. Grief for the wisdom we ignore. Grief for the generations who may inherit a world more fractured than the one we were given.”- Again—so perfectly said.

“And yet, even in this grief, there is responsibility. If the world is not ready to change, then perhaps the work is not to wait for change, but to live, speak, and act from the consciousness we hope will one day take root. Even if we never see the harvest, we can still plant the seeds.”-

This made me think about something so simple, yet meaningful, that happened recently on the farm where I work. I was clearing overgrown blackberry bushes—thick, thorny, unruly—so that in a few months, apple-picking would be possible again. And there it was: a scrappy little plant growing nearby. Not beautiful. Not useful. I was about to rip it out simply because I didn’t like it. But I paused. Something shifted. I stopped thinking of it as an it—an intruder—and saw it as part of me, a quiet we. And I let it live.

“If we are to navigate this age bravely, we must do more than innovate. We must awaken. We must learn to slow down in the midst of speed, to listen in the midst of noise, and to remember that the most powerful technology we possess is not artificial, it is the human capacity for awareness, compassion, and transformation.”-

Peter, I’m honestly in awe—not only of your intellect, but of how clearly and concretely you communicate what matters most. You took something vast and made it feel personal. This post reads not like philosophy, but testimony. Not detached analysis, but a person standing in the thick of it, still choosing to see and care and hope.

Thank you for this.

Eight days ago, you invited me to write a song (“I hear the beginnings of a song?”), so here is one- with the assistance of AI😉:

Grief Is Not the End (for Peter)

We live in bright times with dim hearts.
Everything shines, but fewer things feel alive.
We have more, but we trust less.
We speak faster, but rarely listen.

You didn’t write with anger.
You wrote with grief— for what could be, for what still might.
You said: Plant something anyway. Even if we never see it grow.

That stayed with me.

So I’ll sit with the noise, and choose to listen.
I’ll move a little slower, and make room for hope.
Because maybe change starts like that.

Not in speeches, but in small, human choices that say:
I’m still here. I still care.

Anita and Copilot.

Journaling at almost 10 pm and still light in-between the leaves of the trees outside the windows, definitely light.

Thinking of Alessa, simply because she may be the only one reading my words.

Alessa, the Empathy Expert, no one like you!

Other people who may be reading this, maybe Emma?

Of the hundreds, maybe thousands of people I’ve been communicating with, to one extent or another, since May 2015, who is reading my words?

Maybe one. Maybe two. Maybe a few.

How fragile is human connection, how temporary.

I wish there was much more of an ongoing, dependable, ongoing CONNECTION to hold on to.

Don’t you wish there were a bunch of people, a society you could depend on, a Village you were part of?

Wishing you don’t have to try so hard to belong, not anymore- because you fully BELONG?

Anita (10 pm)