Not Just Another Day

If you’re like me, right now you are sipping your coffee (or tea), reading your morning paper (or more likely, scanning your RSS reader), making a mental checklist of everything you must take care of today.

Just another day.

Image: Lance Johnson, Creative Commons

If you’re like me but on the other side of the world, you are winding down after a hard day’s work, figuring out what to cook for dinner (or what takeout you’ll order), stretching your bones that ache after a day of sitting in front of, and staring too hard, too frequently, too long without interruption, at a brightly lit screen.

Just another day.

Just another day can change in the blink of an eye.

A public relations professional

takes a wrong turn in unfamiliar terrain and a mini-triathlon turns into a narrow escape from a broken neck.

An aspiring singer

steps out of her car to escape the swelter of a malfunctioning air conditioner and is shot to death.

An account manager

traveling on a routine business trip dies in a terrorist attack, his last words memorialized.

As I head to the American Red Cross’ Emergency Social Data Summit this morning, I expect to hear many more stories like these, and how social media – the ephemeral thread that binds us all, whether we like it or not – adds a previously-unimagined dimension to crisis and disaster response.

It will not be just another day.

Even if you’re not there in person, you too can join by following #crisisdata on Twitter, keeping tabs on the Emergency Social Data blog, or watching the livestream on NextGenWeb.

It will not be just another day.