PostSecret Community Picnic

I’ve been a long-time fan of the PostSecret blog. As long as I can remember, I have been checking the site every Sunday, eager to see what had been posted for that week. Every single secret is touching in its own way, but there were some that have resonated with me more than others over the years. One of these is a card I believe was posted in August 2006: “We’re all more alike than I ever could have imagined.” After attending this year’s PostSecret Picnic, I couldn’t help but think about that card.

Let me start by saying that I am not an active member of the online PostSecret community – I’m a pretty shy person, even in an online setting, and I never had the courage to ever post anything on the message boards. I knew that the picnic was for the community members, so I was apprehensive about attending – what if I have no one to talk to? What if I can’t think of anything to say? What if I can’t find anything in common with anyone there? Despite my nerves, I looked forward to attending – worst case scenario, it would be an uncomfortable afternoon and I would be able to go home afterward and move on.

After being at the picnic for awhile, however, I quickly realized I should not have been so worried. What I love most about PostSecret is its ability to bring thousands of strangers together in one great community. This picnic was just a small cross-section of that enormous group, but we definitely all had at least one thing in common – PostSecret. I talked to some of the attendees and swapped stories about postcards that carried extra meaning. PostSecret serves as a great icebreaker, and this shared interest led to conversations ranging from favorite band to darkest moments in life. Over the course of several hours, I could see that despite the differences between everyone who was there, we all really were more alike than I ever did imagine.

The talks by Frank, Reese and Casie were all great and led me to understand a bit more about PostSecret, Hopeline and the issues they deal with. However, it was my discussions with people there like me that affected me the most – recognizing myself in the stories of these strangers. It’s thanks to groups like the PostSecret community that we are able to realize how connected we all are.

-Kirsty

Hey guys!

Included in this past weeks mail was a post card from an illegal immigrant in San Francisco contemplating jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. If you haven't seen it on the website, please check it out!

We were all so moved by the post card and apparently, you were too! Within the past several days, a Facebook group called "Please Don’t Jump" has nearly gained 32,000 members and thousands of supportive comments.

An event is being held on Sunday at the Golden Gate bridge in hopes of helping the sender and other's facing a similar situation. Time's News Feed has already covered this story and we are hoping to gain publicity from several other publications. We would greatly appreciate your support!

Any help at all! Send the link to your local papers, join the facebook group; anything!

Thanks,

Tyler

...Worth All the Papercuts

As interns, a vast majority of our time is spent archiving and organizing secrets-- a task far more dangerous than you'd expect. We're subjected to glittery postcards, sticky postcards, but worst of all... postcards with sharp edges. "Sorry this job doesn't come with health insurance," Frank jokes as I reach for my second band aid of the day.

It's definitely worth all the papercuts. Besides archiving secrets, we interns do everything from brainstorming ways to improve the PostSecret website to helping plan the PostSecret Community picnic. Last week, we even got to help pick some of the Sunday Secrets. Andrew and I spent over 3 hours going through some of the secrets from the past few weeks, and picked out a couple that really stood out to us.

One day's worth of secrets.

Frank gets a LOT of secrets every day, and spends a long time carefully reading each one and deciding whether to post it or set it aside for a display. It was pretty cool to have a little input in the decision process. I related to this secret the most, and was excited it was included in the website this week.

-Michelle

New Interns!!!

As far as first days of new jobs go, this one was by far the most interesting one I'd ever had. After getting a mini tour of headquarters, Ruthie (one of the other new interns) and I sat down with Frank and talked about the PostSecret project in general, and what we, as interns, hoped to gain from the experience. Frank also shared some funny stories and some homemade cookies. My favorite story was about how a couple of fans once called the police to check up on Frank and make sure he was okay when he didn't update the Sunday Secrets on time--- just goes to show what a caring fan base PostSecret has.

After our chat, we got down to business- "brick" making. Frank had us go through older secrets and organize them into neat little piles that were all the same size. It was pretty difficult to sort through the secrets without reading all of them.


"bricks" of secrets




This summer's gonna be great.

-Michelle