Those of us who’ve lived through the flood of ’09 and ’97 (and seemingly countless others) can spend hours telling you our stories. We’ll tell you where we were when we heard our neighborhood was being evacuated or tell you how the water in our backyard rose 2 feet overnight. Maybe we tell these stories as therapy. It makes us feel better to share our hardships. It gives us a sense of community to know, as the kids in High School Musical sang, “We’re all in this together!”

This time around, for Flood 2011, we don’t just want to HEAR your stories, we want you to blog about them. Remember BLOG stands for WEB LOG. And while, in recent years, it’s come to mean so much more at its very core it still can be defined as “a frequently updated personal journal.”  What a great way to chronicle your flood experiences by building an online diary. Tell us what it’s like in your neighborhood, add pictures and video. It’s a great way to document, day by day, how the flood is affecting you.

In addition to hearing your stories, areavoices blogs will be a great place to find important flood information, no matter what part of the region you call home.  Just today, I added “FLOOD” as a category in our blog directory. You’ll be able to see all of the flood blogs that are being written about this flood. In the last couple of days, we have two new flood blogs. First Link, the agency which coordinates volunteers during times of community need, has started a nice blog. http://myfirstlink.areavoices.com. The Forum has also started it’s Community Flood blog, http://communityflood.areavoices.com.

My blog is full of information about how to start your blog. If you need further assistance, I’m just an email away. We’d love to hear from you this flood season and always!